
Gass— I /■ 
Book . 



, 




a^<L^ 



4iL^ 



SCIENCE AND REVELATION; 



^\ 



^ Stries of lectures 



IN REPLY TO 



THE THEORIES 



OF 



TYNDALL, HUXLEY, DARWIN, SPENCER, 



ETC. 








G^ 



(^ 




<-^teki^3;'^W. 



N. 



V 



BELFAST: 
WILLIAM MULLAN. 

NEW \' () R K : 
SCRIBNER, \A/'ELFORD & ARMSTRONG. 

1875. 



PREFACE. 



JTIHESE lectures owe their origin to certain proceedings 
^ connected with the meeting of the British Association 
in Belfast in the autumn of 1874. In his opening address, 
the President thought fit to assail some of the most im- 
portant principles of religion, whether natural or revealed. 
In that address, and in some others subsequently delivered, 
the facts of science were presented as antagonistic to the 
claims of every form of religion which recognises the exist- 
ence of a personal God ; and although the wonders of nature 
were disclosed, the hand of God was ignored. 

Whilst courtesy and precedent forbade any protest at the 
time, it was felt by many, and more especially by those resi- 
dent in Belfast, that such teaching should not be permitted 
to pass unchallenged. The paramount importance of the 
questions at issue, the literary and scientific prestige of the 
men by whom these strange doctrines were propounded, the 
injurious influence which such deliverances were calculated 
to exercise on some minds, and the strong desire expressed 
by many honest and earnest believers in the sacred Scriptures 
that these adverse theories should be thoroughly analysed, 
suggested the necessity of an elaborate defence of the funda- 
mental truths so wantonly impugned ; and at a meeting of 
ministers, held shortly afterwards, the programme of the 
lectures now published was arranged. 

These lectures will speak for themselves, for the men 
who delivered them, and for those Divine truths which 
they so ably and eloquently expound. They will be found 
clear, logical, and conclusive. Each subject is thoroughly 



IV. PREFACE. - 

sifted. H^XQ facts of science are admitted, whilst the infer- 
ences of the savans are disputed. The respective territories 
of science and rehgion are distinctly defined ; and whilst 
the conflicting theories of these philosophers — some mate- 
rialistic, some idealistic, and others rationalistic — are brought 
out as demoralising, and often mutually destructive ; the 
harmony ever subsisting between true philosophy and true 
religion ; the moral beauty of Christianity, and its adaptation 
to the wants and wishes of our common humanity; and the 
being and wisdom and goodness of God as manifested in the 
pages of inspiration, the works of creation, and the arrange- 
ments of providence, will be found unfolded with a fresh- 
ness, a fulness, and a power highly creditable to the men by 
whom the discussion is conducted, and to the Church which 
they so well represent. 

The lectures were delivered in the Presbyterian Church, 
Rosemary Street, Belfast, during the past winter, and have 
already received the favourable imprimatur of the public. 
They have been heard with pleasure and profit by intelli- 
gent audiences, they have been sought for in pamphlet 
form by tens of thousands ; and they are now issued in one 
harmonious whole, and given to the Church and to the 
world, with the earnest prayer that the perusal of the 
volume may confirm many in the faith once delivered to 
the saints, and produce in all who read it a loving and 
intelligent allegiance to Him whom to know is life eternal. 

WM. JOHNSTON, 

Ex- Moderator of the General Assembly, 
Belfast, March, iSyj. 



CONTENTS. 



-♦♦- 



By J. L. PORTER, D.D., LL.D., Belfast. 
Science and Revelation : their Distinctive Provinces. 
With a Review of the Theories of Tyndall, Huxley, Darwin, and 
Herbert Spencer. 



By Dr. MOORE, Glasnevin. 
Design in the Structure and Fertilisation of Plants a 
Proof of the Existence of God. 



By Rev. Professor WATTS, D.D., Belfast. 
An Examination of Herbert Spencer's Biological Hypo- 
thesis. 



By Rev. W. TODD MARTIN, M.A., Newtownards. 
The Doctrine of an Impersonal God in its Effects on 
Morality and Religion. 



By Rev. A. C. MURPHY, M.A., Londonderry. 
Miracles and Prophecy : Direct Proofs that the Bible is 
A Revelation from God. 



By Rev. Professor WALLACE, Belfast. 
Prayer in Relation to Natural Law. 



By Rev. JOHN MACNAUGHTAN, Belfast. 
Man's Responsibility for his Belief. 



By Rev. JOHN MORAN, Belmont. 
The Life and Character of Christ an Evidence of the 
Truth of Christianity. 



By Rev. WILLIAM MAGILL, Cork. 
The Achievements of the Bible a Proof of its Divine 
Origin. 



r 



SCIENCE AND REVELATION. 

^.^^ — ■' ft/ 

To be able to define the exact province and limits of 
each branch of knowledge under investigation, is one 
of the best evidences of intellectual power and logical 
training. Until the student can do so he is not a safe 
guide. And farther, the man who, knowing the limits of 
any particular branch, deliberately attempts, by alleged 
deductions or specious theories, to pass beyond them, is, in 
so far, unworthy of trust ; and his conclusions, even on other 
points within his proper sphere, must be received with 
caution, for a lax method of reasoning, when once indulged 
in, has a tendency to become habitual. No matter how 
profound a man may be in his knowledge of any one de- 
partment, he is not thereby warranted in attempting to 
make that knowlege a passport for theory and speculation, 
nor for dogmatism in another department. It is of the very 
essence of science that the mind form accurate conceptions 
of what is submitted to it ; that it be able to draw round 
each subject a clear line of demarcation, separating it from 
all others, and making it stand out in its distinctive indivi- 
duality. Then only will thought be restrained from what 
is vague and indefinite, and rigidly confined to what is real 
and true. 

I admit that the several departments of knowlege in some 
respects overlap each other, and that all have certain 
mutual relations ; yet this fact does not tend to confuse the 
boundaries of mathematics and psychology, or of science and 
theology, as fields of research and thought ; nor does it 
warrant the student of one department to intrude his views 
and theories into another so as to overthrow its legitimate 
deductions. No psychological belief, for example, can 
affect a mathematical demonstration, and no theological 




4 SCIENCE AND REVELATION. 

dogma can annul a fact of science ; but, on the other hand, 
psychology has a sphere in which mathematics has no 
place, and theology has a sphere into which science must not 
intrude. The method of investigation in each department 
is specifically different. The mathematician has a pro- 
blem which he works out in accordance with certain funda- 
mental axioms, until he arrives at a demonstration which 
cannot be disputed. The scientist examines natural objects 
through his senses ; his mind interprets the observations 
thus made, compares them, and frames generalisations to 
which he gives the name of " laws ;" and these, though 
never attaining the absolute certainty of mathematical de- 
monstrations, are yet, as a rule, readily comprehended and 
accepted as facts of science. In the departments of 
psychology and natural theology a different method is 
followed, because the grand subjects with which they are 
concerned are, for the most part, presented directly to the 
mind, and not to the senses or the logical faculty. They can 
only be grasped and comprehended in their entirety by 
abstract thought and profound reflection — quickened and 
guided in the case of theology by Divine illumination. It 
consequently happens that minds trained to scientific re- 
search alone, and habitually occupied with the severe and 
exact demonstrations of geometry, or with the palpable 
forms of matter, encounter an almost insuperable difhculty 
when they attempt to enter the field of abstract thought. 
They cannot place the problems of metaphysics and theo- 
logy under the microscope, nor can they apply to them the 
test of the mathematical axiom, and, therefore, they cannot 
always comprehend and will not receive them. And yet to 
those who are intellectually qualified for this higher depart- 
ment of knowledge, and thoroughly trained in it, the sub- 
lime truths which it embraces become as definite and as 
convincing as the truths of physical science. It is a well- 
known fact that " each man is strong in that he is trained 
in, weak in other regions — so much so, that often the 
objects there seem to him non-existent."* 

* Shairp, " Culture and Religion/' p. 80. 



SCIENCE AND REVELATION. 5 

All this shows the necessity in these days of determining 
the exact provinces, and defining the precise limits of 
Science and Revelation. The attempts in times past, 
and even yet on the part of the Church of Rome, to fetter 
science by ecclesiastical shackles, have brought discredit 
upon Christianity at large. We hear scientific men now com- 
plaining loudly, but not very logically, that all theologians 
are despots ; and they whine as if they were martyrs to 
free thought. I would, therefore, warn all Christian men 
not to betray, or give the appearance of betraying, any 
opposition to science. Let us look upon it as a friendly 
territory — a province of God's universe, where His foot- 
steps can be traced by every unprejudiced scientific 
observer, and where His wisdom can be seen by every 
philosophic mind. But then, on the other hand, it is plain 
to all educated men that science is at this moment com- 
mitting the very error which it charges on theologians — it 
is striving to invade the province of Revelation, and to 
sweep away its most sublime doctrines, not by established 
facts, but by crude theories and wild speculations. There 
can be no peace between them until each is rigidly con- 
fined to its own sphere ; there they are in harmony, and 
they mutually contribute to the solution of the highest 
problems. As a theologian I have no desire to fetter 
science. I willingly accord to it the utmost freedom, and 
bid it " God speed" in its own field. There it does noble 
service to my cause, enabling me to reason with the uner- 
ring rigour of logic from palpable manifestations of design 
in every department of nature, to the existence of an Omni- 
potent Designer. But when science leaves its legitimate 
field to assail Revelation ; or when the scientist, to use the 
words of the distinguished president of the British Associa- 
tion, having reached the limits of experimental evidence, 
attempts to prolong the vision backwards into the un- 
known,* so as to solve a problem which science cannot solve, 
and thus to overthrow theological truth, then, as a theolo- 
gian, and in the name of science itself, I place an arrest 

* Tyndall, " Acklicss," p. 56. 



6 SCIENCE AND REVELATION. 

upon him as he would do upon me ; and if he will not 
desist, I shall ever feel it my duty to warn the public that 
his conclusions so arrived at, however skilfully framed and 
eloquently expressed, are no more worthy of belief than the 
splendid creations of a poet's fancy. In this course of 
action I am virtually sustained by Professor Tyndall, who 
says — "The profoundest minds know best that Nature's 
ways are not at all times their ways, and that the brightest 
flashes in the world of thought are incomplete until they 
have been proved to have their counterparts in the world 

of fact His experiments constitute a body, of 

which his purified intuitions are, as it were, the soul."* 

By science I here mean Physical or Natural Scie?tce, which 
has for its field the universe of matter, and which, by obser- 
vation and experiment on its various parts and organisms, 
endeavours to gain a knowledge of the facts and phe- 
nomena of matter, with their relations and laws. The 
field of science being the material universe, it follows that 
our knowledge of it must be obtained through the senses ; 
so that scientific evidence is evidence addressed to, and 
apprehended by, the senses ; so far, then, as science is con- 
cerned, the only knowledge we can obtain is through the 
senses, or through legitimate deductions from facts thus 
perceived. 

In investigating the province of science I shall proceed 
as follows : — I shall critically examine the attempts made 
by scientists to solve certain great problems which natur- 
ally force themselves upon the attention of thoughtful 
men in every age. — I. The origin of matter and of the 
existing material universe. II. The origin of life. III. 
The origin of species. IV. The origin of mind ; and, con- 
nected with it, the conceptions formed by mind of a God 
and of a future state. I shall then turn to Revelation, 
sketch its purpose, and define its province. The field 
before me is, as you may see, a very wide one ; it is a field, 
too, which embraces most momentous questions, bearing 
alike on time and eternity, on man's happiness here and on 

* " Fragments of Science,'' p. in. 



SCIENCE AND REVELATION. 7 

his state hereafter. It is difficult to treat it at all within 
the scope of a single lecture ; and I can only promise to 
give you, with as much clearness as is in my power, the 
results of anxious thought and laborious research, extend- 
ing at intervals over many years. 

One point I think it right to notice at the outset, because 
much has been made of it. Professed scientists complain 
that their conclusions are criticised by many who have 
never examined nature for themselves, who have never con- 
ducted a single investigation, physiological, chemical, or 
anatomical ; and they denounce, in no measured terms, 
such presumptuous criticisms. The charge is plausible, but 
not very logical. Let me show this in a sentence. The 
scientist, by his researches, long, minute, laborious, and 
complicated, establishes certain facts. He explains these 
facts in intelligible language, so that all, scientific and non- 
scientific alike, can understand them. Then he proceeds to 
deduce from them conclusions with regard, say, to the 
origin of matter, or the origin of life, or the origin and | 
nature of mind. Now, I take his facts as established 
and explained by himself; and I maintain that I am as 
competent to examine and test the accuracy of the general 
conclusions he professes to deduce from them as he is. It 
is not practical science which is here required, it is logic ; 
and scientific men cannot lay claim to a monopoly of this 
gift. So then, in prosecuting my critical examination, T 
shall not attempt to enter the domain of the professional 
student of nature. I shall simply accept his observations 
and demonstrations ; not his theories, however, nor his 
speculations, nor his guesses, but those phenomena which 
he has established by observation ; and then I shall place 
them side by side with the conclusions to which they are 
supposed to lead, and submit the whole to a searching logi- 
cal analysis. Surely this is not presumption ; and if fairly 
carried out, no real scientist will venture to take exception 
to it. 



8 SCIENCE AND REVELATION. 

I. — The Origin of Matter and of the Existing 
Material Universe. 

The teachings of scientists on matter and the material 
universe are not uniform ; were they so they would have 
much greater weight. Nearly every scientific man has a 
theory of his own, which he propounds with all authority, 
not to say dogmatism ; and it so happens that these theories 
are, for the most part, inconsistent with each other — and 
indeed in some cases mutually destructive. Democritus, a 
Greek sage, who lived about B.C. 400, propounded a theory 
of the structure and origin of the material universe, which 
he appears to have derived from Leucippus, its founder. 
It was substantially adopted by the Latin poet Lucretius, 
whose prime object in adopting it was thereby to banish 
from the mind of man all idea of a creating and superin- 
tending deity. It has received its latest development or 
exposition in the address of Professor Tyndall before the 
meeting of the British Association in Belfast. Its leading 
principles are as follows : — Matter is eternal ; it has two 
characteristics — I. Quantitative relations, which are original; 
2. Qualitative, which are secondary and derived ; and thus 
the distinction between matter and mind is abolished. 
Matter consists ultimately of atoms, which were at first 
distributed through empty space ; the atoms are homo- 
geneous in quality, but heterogeneous in form ; motion is 
the eternal and necessary consequence of the original va- 
riety of atoms in the vacuum ; the atoms are impenetrable, 
and, therefore, offer resistance to one another ; all existing 
forms — the stars, the planets, the earth, plants, animals, 
mind itself — evolved from these atoms ; the process of evo- 
lution began by the atoms striking together, and the lateral 
motions and whirlings thus produced were the beginnings 
of worlds ; the varieties of things depend on the varieties 
of their constituent atoms ; the first cause of all existence 
is necessity, that is, the necessary succession of cause and 
effect. To this succession they gave the name " chance," as 



SCIENCE AND REVELATION. 'J 

Opposed to the "mind" (vovs) of Anaxagoras.* There are 
many differences in details among atomic philosophers, but 
the leading principles are embodied in the foregoing pro- 
positions. Many of the modern atomists admit that matter 
was created, as I shall show in the sequel. 

As this theory is now put forward in the name of science, 
we naturally ask — What are its scientific proofs ? We can- 
not admit theories. They have no weight in our present 
critical investigation. And first — What proof is advanced 
that matter is eternal .-* There is none ; and from the nature 
of the case there can be none. All that science can prove 
is, that matter has existed so long as man has existed to ob- 
serve it. We all admit this ; and farther science cannot pos- 
sibly go. To affirm that it is eternal is a pure assumption, 
which has no logical connection with observed facts. Her- 
bert Spencer rightly says that the eternity, or self-existence, 
of matter is unthinkable ; and he argues, with true philosophic 
insight, that "the assertion that the universe is self-existent 
does not really carry us a step beyond the cognition of its 
present existence ; and so leaves us with a mere re-state- 
ment of the mystery."-}- And, besides, while science cannot 
advance one step towards the proof of the eternity of matter, 
some of the most eminent scientific men of the present age 
affirm that this atomic theory affords the strongest proof 
of the existence of a Creator. At the meeting of the British 
Association in 1873, Professor Clerk Maxwell said, *' We 
are unable to ascribe either the existence of the molecules 
or any of their properties to the operation of any of the 
causes which we call natural." On the other hand, the exact 
equality of each molecule to all others of the same kind 
gives it, as Sir John Herschel has well said, ** the essential 
character of a manufactured article'' And in the seven- 
teenth century, the celebrated French philosopher and 
mathematician, Gassendi, enunciated views substantially the 
same. So much then for the teaching of science as to the 
eternity of matter. 

* Tyndall, "Address," p. 4. Brandis, GeschichtCy !., p. 293, sq. 
t " First Principles," p. 32. 



10 SCIENCE AND REVELATION. 

But we now return to the atoms. Democritus, following 
Leucippus, held that they were originally scattered through- 
out empty space, and that they combined in obedience 
to mechanical laws. Empedocles, a Sicilian philosopher 
of the same age, could not believe this possible, and he 
suggested that the atoms possessed original and elementary 
powers or sensations, some of love and some of hate, and 
that influenced by these sensations they combined or sepa- 
rated. Lucretius conceived the atoms falling eternally 
through space, and their interaction throughout infinite 
time forming the worlds ; it was a truly poetic conception, 
worthy of its author. Professor Clerk Maxwell supposes 
the atoms to have been originally created, and endowed 
with certain powers, under the guidance of which they 
gradually evolved those complex forms now presented to 
the eye of the observer ; and Tyndall, though he speaks with 
hesitation, appears to think that the material atoms possess 
some inherent energy or life ; and hence he discerns in 
"molecular force the agency by which both plants and 
animals are built up," though he does not tell us whence 
this molecular force has come. 

I do not profess to reconcile these discordant theories ; 
nor is it necessary for my purpose, even were it possible. 
My sole object is to submit them to the test of scientific 
proof As to the atoms themselves, they have never yet 
been discovered. Scientists have searched for them ; the 
highest powers of the microscope, and the utmost skill of 
the chemist, have been tried in vain. " Loschmidt, Stoney, 
and Sir William Thomson have sought to determine the 
sizes of the atoms, or rather to fix the limits between which 
their sizes lie,"* and they have failed. Their very existence, 
then, is a theory — a theory, too, which has no logical con- 
nection with any observed fact. And besides, the idea of 
an atom is inconceivable, or, as Herbert Spencer would say, 
it is unthinkable. To conceive of a piece of matter, having 
necessarily, because it is matter, length and breadth, and 
yet being indivisible, is an absurdity. And if we adopt the 

* Tyndall, "Address," p. 26. 



SCIENCE AND REVELATION. 11 

view of Faraday, that atoms are "centres of force," the 
difficulty remains. A centre of force must be either ma- 
terial or immaterial ; if material, the absurdity is as before ; 
if immaterial, then no aggregate of the immaterial could 
form the material universe. Science is thus completely at 
fault regarding these imaginary atoms. 

And when we proceed to test the atomic theory in its 
development, difficulties and absurdities accumulate at every 
stage. It is held that atoms, whether eternal or " manufac- 
tured articles," whether inert or gifted with love and hate, 
or possessing inherent potency, have arranged themselves, 
by chance friction and spontaneous interaction, throughout 
the infinite past, into those forms of wondrous beauty, and 
delicate and complicated mechanism, which we now see in 
every part of the universe, and which appear to be guided 
by wise laws, and adapted to wise ends. What is the scien- 
tific proof of this theory } There is none, and there can 
be none. No scientist professes to have seen atoms building 
up worlds. The nature of the theory places it beyond the 
range of science, away in the infinite past. And farther, 
the theory of matter arranging itself spontaneously into 
systems governed by exact law, and organisms exhibiting 
the most exquisite design, is not only unsupported by 
scientific observation, but is opposed to the whole analogy 
of scientific observation. Spontaneous action is, as Huxley 
rightly says, action without a cause, which is unscientific 
and impossible. It is impossible to conceive of a change 
taking place without a cause, and action necessarily involves 
change, so that spontaneity in matter is an absurdity.* It 
is not one of those physical theories which, as Tyndall 
says, lies beyond experience, but is yet derived by a process 
of abstraction from experience. No process of abstraction 
can derive from experience a thing which is contrary to 
experience. Take as an illustration of the impossibility of 
conceiving mere matter capable of evolving an object 
familiar to us all, the structure of the eye ; and I here bor- 
row the words of one of the most distinguished of living 

* See H. Spencer, " First Principles," p. 32. 



12 SCIENCE AND REVELATION. 

naturalists, Professor Pritchard : — " From what I know, 
through my own speciaHty, both from geometry and ex- 
periment, of the structure of the lenses of the human eye, 
I do not believe that any amount of evolution extending 
through any amount of time, could have issued in the pro- 
duction of that most beautiful and complicated instrument, 
the human eye. The most perfect, and at the same time 
the most difficult, optical contrivance known is the power- 
ful achromatic object-glass of a microscope ; its structure is 
the long unhoped-for result of the ingenuity of many 
powerful minds, yet in complexity and in perfection it falls 
infinitely below the structure of the eye. Disarrange any 
one of the curvatures of the many surfaces, or distances, or 
densities of the latter ; or, worse, disarrange its incompre- 
hensible self-adaptive powers, the like of which is possessed 
by the handiwork of nothing human, and all the opticians 
in the world could not tell you what is the correlative alter- 
ation necessary to repair it, and, still less, to improve it, as 
a natural selection is presimied to imply T* 

Tyndall himself is, in the end, forced to admit that the 
structure of the universe around us is an " insoluble mys- 
tery" ;"-|- and Huxley, after placing the dogma of atheistic 
materialism in its strongest light, says, " The materialistic 
position that there is nothing in the world but matter, force, 
and necessity, is as utterly devoid of justification as the 
most baseless of theological dogmas." ;|; This with him is, 
of course, the acme of incredibility and absurdity. So I am 
content to leave the theory of atomic materialism in the 
position thus assigned to it. 

Here again we see that the solution of the grand pro- 
blem of the orisjin of the universe is bevond the rangre of 
science. And, besides, the inferential teaching of science is 
not exhausted in this negative result. It reveals in nature 
everywhere the existence of force. However far its obser- 
vations extend back, that force cannot be eliminated. It 

♦ Paper read at Brighton, Oct. 8th, 1874. 

t " Address," p. 58. 

X " Lay Sermons," p. 144. 



SCIENCE AND REVELATION. 13 

is involved in the movement of a grain of sand as fully as 
in the circling of the spheres ; and if science here attempt 
to pass beyond the range of sense, and to theorise about 
force existing in atoms, we follow it and say — You are but 
shifting the mystery ; and we press the natural question — 
What put the force in the atoms ? Whence came it ? Thus 
we drive the scientist back and back through every pro- 
vince of his own legitimate domain ; we drive him back, too, 
through those regions of hazy theory and dim speculation, 
in which he loves to expatiate, until at last, by an inex- 
orable logic, we compel him to admit an author of force — 
the Great First Cause. Tyndall has virtually admitted this 
in a lecture delivered at Manchester only a few days ago. 
I ask special attention to his words, which conclude a long 
argument on force : — " In my ignorance of it all, I have 
asked myself whether there is no power, being, or thing, in 
the universe whose knowledge of that of which I am so 
ignorant is greater than mine. I have asked myself, can it 
be possible that man's knowledge is the greatest knowledge 
— that man's life is the highest life.'* My friends, the /r^- 
fession of that atheism with which I am sometimes so lightly 
charged would, in my case, be an impossible anszuer to the 
questionr* 

II. — The Origin of Life. 

The origin of life is a still deeper problem than the pre- 
ceding, and it is at present occupying the thoughts of the 
first scientists of the age. Huxley, Owen, and Darwin may 
be regarded as the leading men, at least in England, in 
physiological observation. Tyndall follows in their wake ; 
and Herbert Spencer is the philosopher who, systematising 
their observations and deducing from them general prin- 
ciples, endeavours, by a recondite biology, to trace life to 
its source and to reveal its cause. I shall try to show you 
the line of argument, and to test its scientific accuracy. 
And here again let me remind you that I do not profess to 

* " Crystalline and Molecular Forces," p. 12. 



1-4 SCIE^'CE AXD REVELATION. 

enter the laboratory or the dissecting-room ; nor do I care 
to follow Professor Huxley in his curious and cruel experi- 
ments on animal organisms ; I accept his own established 
facts, and my only duty is to put to the test of a rigorous 
logic the conclusions drawn from them. 

In attempting to discover the origin of life, the eye of the 
professional physiologist is naturally turned to the germ in 
which the life-power, if I may so speak, lies, and in which 
it begins to develop ; the ultimate object being to ascertain 
how it springs into operation, and what is its cause. 
Huxley's description is very graphic, and I must give it in 
full : — " Examine the recently-laid egg of some common 
animal, such as a salamander or a newt. It is a minute 
spheroid in which the best microscope will reveal nothing 
but a structureless sac, enclosing a gl3.iry fluid, holding 
granules in suspension. But strange possibilities lie dor- 
mant in that semi-fluid globule. Let a moderate supply of 
warmth reach its water}' cradle, and the plastic matter un- 
dergoes changes so rapid and yet so steady and purpose-like 
in their succession, that one can only compare them to those 
operated by a skilled modeller upon a formless lump of clay. 
As with an invisible trowel, the mass is divided and sub- 
divided into smaller and smaller portions, until it is reduced 
to an aggregation of granules not too large to build withal 
the finest fabrics of the nascent organism. And then, it is 
as if a delicate finger traced out the line to be occupied by 
the spinal column, and moulded the contour of the body ; 
pinching up the head at one end, and the tail at the other, 
and fashioning flank and limb into due salamandrine pro- 
portions, in so artistic a way, that, after watching the pro- 
cess hour by hour, one is almost involuntarily possessed by 
the notion, that some more subtle aid to vision than an 
achromatic would show the hidden artist, with his plan 
before him, striving with skilful manipulation to perfect his 
work." And then, to sum up the entire results of his scien- 
tific observations, he adds : — " WTiat is true of the newt is 
true of every animal and of every plant ; the acorn tends 
to build itself up again into a woodland giant such as that 



SCIENCE AND REVELATION. 15 

from whose twig it fell ; the spore of the humblest lichen 
reproduces the green or brown incrustation which gave it 
birth ; and at the other end of the scale of life, the child that 
resembled neither the paternal nor the maternal side of the 

house would be regarded as a kind of monster 

It is the first great law of reproduction, that the offspring, 
tends to resemble its parent or parents."* 

But what light does all this throw upon the origin of life ? 
None. Quite true, Huxley adds, " Science will some day 
show us how this law is a necessary consequence of the 
more general laws which govern matter." But this is just a 
gratuitous theory, a prophecy, in fact, springing from Mr. 
Huxley's foregone opinion, and having no logical connection 
with his scientific observations. The fact is, his observa- 
tions tend to a widely different conclusion. They show us 
the guiding power which that mysterious entity we call life 
exercises upon matter, moulding it at will into forms of 
exquisite beauty and wide diversity ; they show us that life 
cannot be a unit, that is, a thing of one essence and type, 
emanating from matter ; for, were it so, then its operations 
upon matter would be uniform, and there would be but one 
class of organisms in the universe. Or, suppose we admit, 
with Herbert Spencer, that the life-principle is modified to 
meet the requirements of its environments, then the nature 
of the full-grown animal could never be predicted, as that 
would depend on the environments, which accident might 
entirely change. On the contrary, Huxley's researches 
prove that there are essentially distinct types of life, though 
they all seem to have the same elementary material basis ; 
and that each type operates upon matter — the very same 
matter — with such irresistible guiding potency as to build 
it up into forms exactly corresponding to the parent stock. 
Science cannot in this respect control it, it can only observe 
it. Matter — all life's visible environment — can do nothing 
except supply what may be called the raw material. Life 
guides the moulding and building in entire independence 
alike of man and of matter ; and all scientific observation 

* "Lay Sermons," pp. 261, 262. 



16 



SCIENCE AND REVELATION. 



proves that life — pre-existing life — is absolutely necessary 
to the building up of animal organisms. 

But scientists have tried to go deeper, and we must 
follow them. The material germ or protoplasm^ as it is 
now technically termed, has been subjected to the keen 
scrutiny of the microscope, and the searching analysis of 
the chemist. Its constituent elements have been discovered 
and described. Huxley says, " All the forms of protoplasm 
which have yet been examined contain the four elements, 
carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, and nitrogen, in very complex 
union."* In whatever form it appears, " whether fungus or 
oak, worm or man," its elements are the same ; and when 
life in it becomes extinct, it " is resolved into its mineral and 
lifeless constituents." *(• It is admitted that carbon, hydro- 
gen, oxygen, and nitrogen are lifeless bodies ; and that they 
all exist previous to their union ; " but when they are 
brought together," says Huxley, " under certain conditions 
they give rise to protoplasm, and this protoplasm exhibits 
the phenomena of life."j Would it not, at first sight, 
appear from these words as if science had at length succeeded 
in solving the grand mystery of the origin of life. It knows 
all the elements of protoplasm ; and there is no lack of them 
in nature. They exist everywhere around us. " With my 
own hands," writes Professor Pritchard, " a quarter of a cen- 
tury ago, I obtained all the elements which I found in an 
^^<g and in grains of wheat out of a piece of granite and 
from the air which surrounded it, element for element. It 
has been one of the most astonishing and unexpected results 
of modern science that we can unmistakably trace these 
very elements also in the stars." § So, then, the elements 
are known, and are at hand ; science can put them to- 
gether ; and Professor Huxley says, " I can find no in- 
telligible ground for refusing to say that the properties of 
protoplasm" — that is, of course, life — " result from the nature 
and disposition of its molecules." || Yet he cannot produce 
life from those materials. Science here utterly fails. Its 

* "Lay Sermons," p. 130. f Ibid, p. 131. X Ibid, p. 135. 

§ Paper read at Brighton. || "Lay Sermons," p. 138. 



SCIENCE AND REVELATION. 17 

field, alike of potency and of knowledge, is at this point 
shut in by an impassable barrier. Huxley confesses that 
pre-existing living matter is absolutely requisite to the 
development of the phenomena of life, and he admits that 
its influence "is something quite unintelligible;" while 
Pritchard affirms that " no chemist, with all his wonderful 
art, has ever yet witnessed the evolution of a living thing 
from those lifeless molecules of matter and force."* 

So far, then, as science is concerned, we are as remote as 
ever from the solution of the problem of the origin of life. 
Scientists have tried to produce life from its so-called 
physical basis, but every trial has been a failure. They 
have tried also to trace it to its origin ; but they have only 
been able to observe its phenomena — they cannot reach its 
source, nor can they reveal its nature. They see motion 
and development in the living protoplasm ; but these are 
the effects of a life already existing, not the essence or prin- 
ciple of life itself Herbert Spencer describes life as " a 
continuous adjustment of internal relations to external 
relations ;" but this Delphian utterance, if it have any 
meaning at all, can only refer to the phenomena of life ; it 
does not touch its essence, nor does it throw one ray of light 
upon its origin. That the life is inherent in, or evolved by, 
matter is inconceivable, for the living protoplasm often dies, 
and then, though all the material elements are still there, 
development ceases at once ; the power which moulds and 
builds has gone mysteriously as it came, and no human 
agency can again vitalise the dead mass, which now obeys 
the ordinary laws of matter, and is resolved into its mineral 
constituents. " The living body resists the chemical 
agencies that are ready to attack it ; the dead body at once 
succumbs to these agencies." Life is the power which 
moulds and builds up organisms, and preserves the matter 
of which they are composed from the dissolving force of the 
ordinary laws to which mere matter is subject. The teach- 
ing of science, therefore, is, that life is something apart from 
matter ; but what it is — whence it comes and whither it 

* Paper read at Brighton. 
B 



18 SCIENCE AND REVELATION. 

goes — science cannot tell. Its operation on matter is' 
wonderful. It guides the chemical forces already existing, 
so as to arrange inert matter into shapes of the most ex- 
quisite proportions, and organisms of the most delicate and 
complicated mechanism — all of which are entirely distinct 
from those normal forms which the constituent elements 
would assume, if uncontrolled by the life-principle. And 
then again, when the life departs, the very matter in which 
it existed, and which it moulded with such mystic power 
into bodies of matchless grace and beauty, speedily becomes 
a mass of loathsome rottenness, and dissolves into its ori- 
ginal elements. Professor Huxley is, in the end, forced to 
admit all this, when he speaks of the " living protoplasm" 
which preserves and builds up organic forms, and the 
"dead protoplasm" which is resolved into its mineral con- 
stituents ; but he tries to save his favourite theory by 
affirming — not in accordance with, but in spite of logical 
sequence — that the phenomena presented by protoplasm, 
living or dead, are its properties ;* and that all vital action 
may be said to be the result of the molecular forces of the 
protoplasm which displays it. How, I ask, can vital action 
be the result of molecular forces alone, when, according to 
the Professor's own admission, the influence of pre-existing 
living matter is shown by scientific observation to be 
necessary to vital action .'* The vital action is clearly the 
result, not of molecular forces, but of the life-principle ope- 
rating on the protoplasm. In denying this, Huxley sacri- 
fices his logic to his theory ; and he would do well thought- 
fully to read Tyndall's striking words : — " There is in the 
true man of science a wish stronger than the wish to have 
his beliefs upheld — namely, the wish to have them true. 
And the stronger wish causes him to reject the most 
plausible support, if he has reason to suspect that it is viti- 
ated by error. Those to whom I refer as having studied 
this question, believing the evidence off"ered in favour of 
spontaneous generation to be thus vitiated, cannot accept 
it. They know full well that the chemist now prepares 

* " Lay Sermons," p. 1 37. 



SCIENCE AND REVELATION. 19 

from inorganic matter a vast array of substances which 
were some time ago regarded as the sole products of 
vitality. They are intimately acquainted with the structural 
power of matter as evidenced in the phenomena of crystal- 
lisation ; they can justify, scientifically, their belief in its 
potency, under the proper conditions, to produce organisms ; 
but in reply to your ques^-ion they will frankly admit their 
inability to point to any satisfactory experimental proof that 
life can be developed save from demonstrable antecedent 
life."* Tyndall's final conclusion is contained in these 
words : — " In fact, the whole process of evolution is the 
manifestation of a Power absolutely inscrutable to the in- 
tellect of man. As little in our days as in the days of Job 
can man by searching find this Power out. Considered 
fundamentally, then, it is by the operation of an insoluble 
mystery that life on earth is evolved. "-[- 

This is enough for my purpose. The limits of the pro- 
vince of science are here drawn definitely by the President 
of the British Association. Science shows that life is an 
entity, a power, apart from and above matter, but that in its 
essence it eludes the keen eye of the philosopher ; that it 
cannot be discovered by the researches of the physiologist ; 
that it will not emanate from the retort of the chemist, 
however skilfully he arrange and manipulate the elements of 
its physical basis ; that, in fact, it lies hid among those sub- 
lime mysteries of nature which human wisdom utterly fails 
to penetrate, and which the Infinite Wisdom of the Great 
Creator can alone reveal to the yearning spirit of His faith- 
ful creatures. The whole teachings of science are, so far as 
they can go, in harmony with that simple but sublime 
record — " And the Lord God formed man of the dust of 
the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of 
life ; and man became a living soul."| 

* " Address," &c., p. 56. 
t " Address," p. 57. 
X Gen. ii. 7. 



20 SCIENCE AND REVELATION. 



III. — The Origin of Species. 

Darwin is the apostle of the doctrine of development, 
though the idea was broached long before his day. To the 
naturalist, Darwin's book on " The Origin of Species" is one 
of the most important contributions to modern science ; to 
the logician, it is an utter failure. As a scientific observer, 
an acute, laborious, skilful, profound student of nature, 
Darwin has perhaps no equal ; but his reasoning faculty- 
seems to have been completely overwhelmed by the force 
of one preconceived idea. The range of his research has 
been wonderful ; he has roamed over the world to sift and 
amass materials ; he has recorded the results with a lucidity 
that leaves nothing to be desired ; and yet one can, with 
perfect logical consistency, admit the whole of his observed 
facts, and reject the whole of his theories. He has a strange 
way of overlooking what logicians call the middle term ; 
that is, the connecting link between the fact established by 
scientific observation, and the conclusion which he professes 
to deduce from it. Professor Huxley — whom Tyndall cha- 
racterised, and rightly too, as Darwin's ablest interpreter — 
virtually acknowledges this when he says, "that notwith- 
standing the clearness of the style, those who attempt fairly 
to digest the book find much of it a sort of intellectual 
pemmican — a mass of facts crushed and pounded into shape, 
rather than held together by the ordinary medium of an 
obvious logical bond." Yet he attempts, in his own pecu- 
liar way, to account for this, and in some measure to re- 
move its damaging force. " From sheer want of room," 
he suggests, " much has to be taken for granted which might 
readily enough be proved ; and hence, while the adept, who 
can supply the missing links in the evidence from his own 
knowledge, discovers fresh proof of the singular thorough- 
ness with which all difficulties have been considered and all 
unjustifiable supposition avoided, at every re-perusal of Mr. 
Darwin's pregnant paragraphs, the novice in biology is apt 



SCIENCE AND REVELATION. 21 

to complain of the frequency of what he fancies is gratuitous 
assumption." * 

Well, I presume Professor Huxley himself is not a novice 
in biology. I have no doubt he would lay claim — and, in 
fact, he does lay claim — to be an adept of sufficient skill to 
supply any missing link, when possible ; yet even he does 
not hesitate, in the end, to admit that Darwin's theory of 
the origin of species is only "a hypothesis."-)- It has 
not, therefore, in Huxley's estimation, any real scientific 
basis. 

My limits forbid an attempt to analyse Darwin's whole 
theory ; I can only glance at one or two leading points. 
The essence of his theory is, that all forms of life, from the 
humblest zoophyte up to man, have evolved from one 
primordial germ. His theory, while it may admit a primal 
act of creation, yet sets aside the Bible narrative, and assigns 
to man a common parentage with the monkey and the 
worm. The line of proof is, that species may be originated 
by selection; that natural causes are competent to exert 
selection ; and that the most remarkable phenomena ex- 
hibited by the distribution, development, and mutual rela- 
tions of species, can be shown to be deducible from the 
general doctrine of their origin, combined with the known 
facts of geological change ; " and that, even if all these 
phenomena are not at present explicable by it, none are 
necessarily inconsistent with it."J 

It will be easily seen that the crucial point is the first. 
We naturally ask — What are the proofs of this startling 
assertion that species may be originated by selection ? 
Does it rest on any sound scientific basis ? Have we evi- 
dence that any distinct species has been originated ? I have 
not space to examine Darwin's observed facts. I admit 
their accuracy ; but I deny that any or all of them satisfy 
the requirements of logic, as proofs of the truth of his 
theory. No man has ever seen a species originated. The 
impossibility of submitting the theory to a scientific test is 
admitted, for the process is relegated away into the infinite 
* " Lay Sermons," p. 257. f /did, p. 295. X Ibid^ p. 293. 



22 



SCIENCE AND REVELATION. 



past. Thus Darwin writes, " Nature grants vast periods of 
time for the work of natural selection." Again, "The chief 
cause of our natural unwillingness to admit that one species 
has given birth to another and distinct species is, that we 
are always slow in admitting any great change of which we 
have not seen the intermediate steps. The mind cannot 
possibly grasp the full meaning of a hundred million of 
years. It cannot add up and perceive the full effects of 
many slight variations accumulated during almost an in- 
finite series of generations." All this, and there is much 
in the book of a like character, is very striking and very 
original ; but any one can see that it is not scientific. 
Science has its basis in observation ; and the things here 
mentioned are all outside the field of observation. The 
facts which Darwin's own observations establish are in- 
significant modifications of race, most of them under man's 
guiding skill, and which confessedly tend to disappear again 
when man withdraws and nature resumes its sway. In fact, 
it appears to me that the fundamental error in Darwin's rea- 
soning is, his accepting slight variations of race as a proof 
of transmutation of species. 

Darwin draws largely upon an infinite past. Countless 
ages form the basis of his theory. Without these, develop- 
ment could not have reached its present stage. But Sir 
Wm. Thompson, one of the greatest of our natural philo- 
sophers, "has dissipated all speculation regarding an infinite 
series of life-forms, by proving that they could not extend 
over millions of millions of years ; because, assuming that 
the heat has been uniformly conducted out of the earth, 
as it is now, it must have been so intense within a com- 
paratively limited period, as to be capable of miclting a 
mass of rock equal to the bulk of the whole earth."* What 
would have become of Darwin's half-developed animals 
under such circumstances ? 

It may possibly be said that I am no scientist, and that, 
therefore, my opinion on this point is worthless. I should not 
wonder if some person with a great name, or with no name 
^ Frazer, " Blending Lights," p. 4. 



SCIENCE AND REVELATION. 



23 



at all, would charge me with presumption, in attempting to 
criticise such a book as " The Origin of Species." Now, 
while maintaining that I am just as competent to test the 
character and soundness of a logical sequence as any scien- 
tist — and that is the sole point here at issue — I am, at the 
same time, in order to avoid the possibility of cavil, content 
to adopt the conclusion of one whose scientific eminence 
will not be questioned. Professor Huxley says : — " After 
much consideration, and with assuredly no bias against Mr. 
Darwin's views, it is our clear conviction that, as the evi- 
dence stands, it is not absolutely proven that a group of 
animals, having all the characteristics exhibited by species in 
nature, has ever been originated by selection, whether arti- 
ficial or natural."* This is clear, and ought to be conclu- 
sive. I could say nothing more damaging to Mr. Darwin's 
theory. Another distinguished scientist, M. Flourens, 
strikes at the very root of the theory in a single sentence — 
" Natural selection is only nature under another name 

. . it is nature personified ; that is, nature endowed 
with the attributes of God."-|- I conclude, therefore, that 
Darwin totally fails in his attempt, by science, " to banish 
the belief in the continued creation of new species." 

One other point in Darwin's theory I must notice. In 
answer to the question, How do groups of species arise ? 
he says — " From the struggle for life. Owing to this 
struggle for life, any variation, however slight and from 
whatever cause proceeding, if it be in any degree profitable 
to an individual of any species, in its infinitely complex 
relations to other organic beings and to external nature, 
will tend to the preservation of that individual, and will 
generally be inherited by its offspring. The offspring, also, 
will thus have a better chance of surviving ; for, of the many 
individuals of any species which are periodically born, but 
a small number can survive. I have called this principle, 
by which each slight variation, if useful, is preserved, by 
the term Natural Selection, in order to mark its relation to 

* " Lay Sermons," p. 295. 

t Sec "The Darwinian Theory Examined," p. 135. 



-^ SCIEN'CE AXD RE\T:LATI0X. 

man's power of selection."* The essence of this theor>' is, 
that all the wonderful adaptations which we find in the 
physical structure of the various species of animals, to the 
conditions in which they are placed, to the work they have 
to do, to the wants they have to supply, have sprung from 
a long and fortuitous sequence of natural events, to which 
2\Ir. Darwin gives the scientific name, Natural Selection. If 
this be true, then the most beautiful and complex organs 
of animals — the heart and veins, the nervous system, the 
human hand, the eye, the mind itself, with all its wondrous 
faculties — have been constructed, not by the infinite wisdom 
of an Almighty Creator, adapting every part and organ 
and faculty, with requisite skill, to the oflfice it was designed 
to fill ; but from a medley of blind chance, countless 
blunders, and innumerable minute accidental modifications, 
which occurred in the strua"£[le for existence duringr mvriads 
of past ages. The fish was not designed for the water ; the 
bird was not designed to fly ; the ear was not designed for 
hearing ; the e}'e was not designed for seeing ; all these, 
says Darwin, are just the fortuitous products of organised 
matter pushing its way at ra.ndom, and after incalculable 
instances of trial and failure, during incalculable ages, at 
last hitting on what was best.-f 

And what is the evidence on which he bases this theorj', 
which to ever\' tiioughful man must, at first sight, appear 
incredible ? Nothing short of actual observation of the 
whole alleged process could, in such a case, satisfy the re- 
quirements of science, or make the theor)- even credible. 
There has been no such obserx-ation, and no such obser\-a- 
tion is possible, because the process of development is sup- 
posed to have extended over an " almost infinite series of 
generations." It thus lies outside the province of science, 
and has therefore no claim upon the belief of scientific men. 
Darwin himself only advances it as a theor}-. " By the 
theory of natural selection," he says, " all living species have 
been connected with the parent species of each genus, by 

* " Origin of Species." p. 6i. 

t See " The Darwinian Theor)- Examined," p. 286. 



SCIENCE AND REVELATION. 25 

differences not greater than we see between the varieties of 
the same species in the present day."* And here, as it 
seems to me, is the fundamental logical fallacy which takes 
away its basis even as a theory. He argues from the 
existence of slight varieties in the same species to the 
entire transmutation of species. The former is admitted on 
all hands ; the latter has no logical connection with it, and 
is, besides, opposed to scientific observation. Yet Professor 
Huxley records his conviction that Darwin's theory has 
given a " death-blow" to teleology ; that is, to the grand 
doctrine of design in nature. Huxley's critique on this 
point is inimitable. I do not believe there is anything com- 
parable to it in the whole range of literature. To do it 
justice, I must give it in full and in his own words : — '* The 
teleological argument runs thus : an organ or organism is 
precisely fitted to perform a function or purpose ; there- 
fore it was specially constructed to perform that function. 
In Paley's famous illustration, the adaptation of all the parts 
of the watch to the function or purpose of showing the 
time, is held to be evidence that the watch was specially 
contrived to that end ; on the ground, that the only cause 
we know of, competent to produce such an effect as a 
watch which shall keep time, is a contriving intelligence 
adapting the means directly to that end. 

" Suppose, however, that anyone had been able to show 
that the watch had not been made directly by any person, 
but that it was the result of the modification of another 
watch which kept time but poorly ; and that this again 
had proceeded from a structure which could hardly be 
called a watch at all, seeing that it had no figures on the 
dial, and the hands were rudimentary ; and that, going back 
and back in time, we came at last to a revolving barrel 
as the earliest traceable rudim.ent of the whole fabric. 
And imagine that it had been possible to show that all 
these changes had resulted, first, from a tendency of the 
structure to vary indefinitely ; and, secondly, from some- 
thing in the surrounding world which helped all variations 

* *' Origin of Species," p. 2S1. 



26 



SCIENCE AND REVELATION. 



in the direction of an accurate time-keeper, and checked all 
those in other directions ; then it is obvious that the force of 
Paley's argument would be gone. For it would be demon- 
strated that an apparatus thoroughly well adapted to a par- 
ticular purpose might be the result of a method of trial 
and error worked by unintelligent agents, as well as of the 
direct application of the means appropriate to that end, by 
an intelligent agent. 

"Now, it appears to us that what we have here, for 
illustration's sake, supposed be done with the watch, is 
exactly what the establishment of Darwin's theory will do 
for the organic world."* 

Well, if Paley's argument remain in force until we are 
able to produce " a developed watch," my impression is it 
will last a long time ; and if Darwin's theory must wait for 
support until that watch be discovered, then the process of 
proof will reach at least as far into the future as the process of 
the evolution of species reaches into the past. True, Pro- 
fessor Huxley puts his evolved watch forward as a supposi- 
tion ; but is it not monstrous to propound such a supposi- 
tion in the name of science ? It reads more like a broad 
joke from a corner in '' Punch" than an extract from a 
scientific lecture. Professor Huxley is an unsparing an- 
tagonist. He uses every weapon which irony and ridicule 
and vituperation can furnish to overwhelm his opponents. 
He exposes with unmitigated contempt every weak point, 
real or fancied, in their reasoning. He does not hesitate 
to question the motives, especially of Christian men, and 
to charge them with downright dishonesty. I recommend 
him in future to store up all these special gifts of his for 
home use, because I feel convinced that no writer, lay or 
clerical, ancient or modern, so richly deserved their full and 
concentrated force, as the author of the theory of a de- 
loped watch. 

Teleology remains in its high seat, absolutely unmoved by 
theories which one can only rightly describe, in the graphic 
words of Carlyle, as " diluted insanity." We have heard 

* "Lay Sermons," pp. 301-2. 



SCIENCE AND REVELATION. 27 

Huxley's opinion ; but how very differently men of the 
highest scientific attainments interpret the observations of 
Darwin may be seen from the following eloquent words 
recently uttered by Professor Pritchard : — " I know of no 
greater intellectual treat — I might even call it moral — 
than to take Mr. Darwin's most charming work on the 
' Fertilisation of Orchids,' and his equally charming and 
acute monograph on the Lythrums, and repeat, as I have 
repeated, many of the experiments and observations therein 
detailed. The effect on my mind was an irresistible im- 
pulse to uncover and bow my head, as being in the too 
immediate presence of the wonderful prescience and bene- 
volent contrivance of the UNIVERSAL FATHER. And I 
think such, also, would be the result on the convictions and 
the emotions of the vast majority of average men. I think 
the verdict would be that no plainer marks of contriving 
will exist in a steam-engine, or a printing-press, or a tele- 
scope." Design in nature can be seen by every unpreju- 
diced man who observes nature, or who thoughtfully studies 
the recorded observations of others. Every fresh discovery 
in physiology ; every searching glance of the scientist into 
the wonderful mechanism of the animal frame ; every 
minute inspection of the marvellous adaptation of insect 
organisms to the complicated structure of flowers ; in a 
word, every new achievement of the scientific mind in ex- 
ploring the vast domain of nature, reveals more clearly, and 
establishes more firmly, the presence everywhere, and in 
everything, of an infinitely powerful and infinitely wise 
designing Mind. Unseen by human eye, undiscoverable by 
scientific observation in the mystery of its working, we yet 
discern the impress and recognise the beneficent control of 
that Infinite Mind in earth and sea and sky. 

IV.— The Origin of Mind, and the Conceptions 

FORMED BY IT OF GOD AND OF A FUTURE STATE. 

This is the highest problem with which science has 
ventured to grapple ; and even the most daring of scientists 



28 SCIENCE AND REVELATION. 

approach it with feelings akin to awe. Democritus, as we 
have seen, held that the soul consists of fine, smooth, round 
atoms, like those of fire. Huxley says, "Even those manifes- 
tations of intellect, of feeling, and of will, which we rightly 
name the higher faculties, are not excluded from this 
classification, inasmuch as to everj'one but the subject of 
them, they are known only as transitor}' changes in the 
relative positions of parts of the body."* In another place 
he says somewhat more clearly, " And what do we know of 
that 'spirit' over whose threatened extinction by matter a 
great lamentation is arising, except that it is also a name 
for an unknown and hypothetical cause, or condition, of 
states of consciousness ? In other words, matter and spirit 
are but names for the imaginary substrata of groups of 
natural phenomena." -f Tyndall is a little more explicit 
when he thus writes : — " Xot alone the mechanism of the 
human body, but that of the human mind itself — emotion, 
intellect, will, and all their phenomena — were once latent in 
a fier\' cloud." All this reads like " Material Atheism." I 
ami not alone in this opinion. But as the language is some- 
what hazy, and as Tyndall and Huxley seem indignant that 
they should be charged with holding such a dogma, I leave 
them to explain their meaning, and to give to the world 
their scientific creed in intelligible language. One thing, 
however, is clear : whatever view of the origin and nature of 
the human mind the words of each are intended to give, 
they do not attempt to establish it by scientific evidence. 
It is confessedly outside the legitimate province of science. 
Xo observation has ever yet reached, or can ever reach, the 
development of a fiery cloud into emotion, intellect, will, 
and all the phenomena of the human mind. It is a daring 
theory, and nothing more. Tyndall himself seems to shrink 
from it in moments of thoughtfulness, when fancy is re- 
strained by judgment — " What baftles and bewilders me, is 
the notion that from those physical tremors things so utterly 
incongruous with them as sensation, thought, and emotion 
can be derived ;" and then he puts the problem in its true 

* 'Lay Sennons,'' p. 122. f IdiW, p. 143. 



SCIENCE AND REVELATION. 29 

light in a single sentence : " You cannot satisfy the human 
understanding in its demand for logical continuity between 
molecular processes and the phenomena of consciousness. 
This is the rock on which materialism must inevitably 
split whenever it pretends to be a complete philosophy of 
life."* Herbert Spencer is right in asserting that of the 
substance of mind nothing is known, or can be known, by 
science. Even the faculties of the mind are outside the 
field of science ; for we get our knowledge of them, not 
through the senses, but by introspection or consciousness. 
Science looks outward for its proofs, psychology inward. 
It is quite true that the phenomena of mind are exhibited 
to all, except the individual himself, in one way or another 
through a material medium, and are apprehended by the 
senses ; yet, in the case of the individual himself, they are 
apprehended in a dififerent way. Consciousness alone, 
therefore, has direct access to the mind ; and it is the ulti- 
mate source of all mental knowledge. So, then, science 
can throw no light on the great problem now before us. 

But, besides, it is by mind the scientist obtains his know- 
ledge of nature. The senses are only the material avenues 
through which the mind apprehends physical phenomena. 
The senses observe, but to the observations thus made must 
be added primary beliefs or intuitions, ere any intelligible 
interpretation, even of the simplest phenomena, can be 
given. It is from intuition we derive our knowledge of the 
reality of the external world and everything in it ; for sen- 
sation is only the apprehension by the mind of an impression 
made on the sensorium, and it is the mind itself which 
intuitively forms the conception of the reality of the object 
that made the impression. So, in like manner, from intuition 
we get our knowledge of the properties of matter, such as 
weight, extension, and force ; it is by intuition we form 
comparisons ; and it is from intuition we obtain our ideas 
of cause and effect. The senses, on whatever object exer- 
cised, and though aided by the utmost experience of tlic 
physicist, and the utmost precision of instruments, merely 

* "Address," p. 33. 



30 SCIENCE AND REVELATION. 

make certain impressions on the mind ; and those impres- 
sions must be interpreted by our intuitions ere they can be 
of use in science. So then, af£er all, our primary beliefs, 
or the intuitions of our mind, form the foundation of all 
scientific reasoning. Dr. Carpenter, in his address as Presi- 
dent of the British Association in 1872, set this matter in 
its true light. " Even in astronomy, the most exact of the 
sciences, we cannot proceed a step without translating the 
actual phenomena of nature into intellectual representations 
of those phenomena."* It is this great fact which lies at 
the foundation of all those differences which exist among 
scientists themselves.*!' The minds of some are warped by 
theories ; others entertain strange views regarding primary 
beliefs ; and consequently their interpretation of the very 
same natural phenomena differ as widely as the poles. 
Darwin, for instance, interprets certain observed phenomena 
so as to support his theory, that all the species of animals 
are derived from one primordial germ ; while Professor 
Kolliker, a German naturalist of equal eminence, interprets 
the same phenomena in a way totally different.; A more 
remarkable illustration is the following : — Rude flint im- 
plements have been found in gravel-beds in France. It has 
been argued with great force that, because they exhibit 
evidence of design, they must have been formed by hum^an 
hands, though their age is believed to extend thousands of 
years beyond the Mosaic period. But some members of 
the very same school of science, who point to these flints as 
triumphant refutations of the Bible, refuse to recognise any 
evidence of design in the structure of plants and animals, 
because thereby they would be compelled to acknowledge 
the existence of a God. I have not time to dwell upon this 
instructive phase alike of scientific scepticism and credulity ; 
but there can be no doubt we have here, in the fact that the 
individual mind is the interpreter of all natural phenomena, 
the fruitful source of many of those errors which have ap- 

* "Report," p. 73- 

t See Tyndall, " Cr^^stalline and Molecular Forces," p. 7. 

X Huxley, " Lay Sermons," p. 300. 



SCIENCE AND REVELATION. 31 

peared under the name of science, as well as of those wild 
theories which have not even a shadow of logical connection 
with scientific observations. 

There is one point to which I must ask attention ere I 
close this part of my subject. Among our primary beliefs 
is that of " cause and effect," and, what is embodied in it, 
" force." Believing in these, we must carry them back and 
back, until at length, compelled by an inexorable logic, we 
believe in a First Cause, the primal origin of force. Herbert 
Spencer enunciates the same truth with much clearness : — 
" We cannot think at all about the impressions which the 
external world produces on us, without thinking of them as 
caused ; and we cannot carry out an inquiry concerning 
their causation, without inevitably committing ourselves to 
the hypothesis of a First Cause."* Science, of itself, does 
not reveal, because it cannot reach, that First Cause ; but 
science reveals phenomena which, being rightly interpreted, 
lead by sound logical sequence to a belief in that First Cause. 
Here, then, is borderland between Science and Revelation. 

And farther, the mind which, as we have seen, embodies 
those primary beliefs that constitute the foundation of all 
scientific reasoning, has other beliefs, equally definite, con- 
nected intimately with the doctrine of a Great First Cause, 
or, to speak plainly, of God. There is in the mind of every 
man, from the rudest savage to the most gifted philosopher, 
the belief that he is dependent on some superior Being ; 
that he owes allegiance to Him ; that there is a moral law ; 
that we are responsible for obedience or disobedience to it ; 
and that there is a future state. This latter especially we 
cannot quench. Do what we will, reason as we will, our 
higher nature looks away onward with earnest, irrepressible, 
unceasing yearning, to immortality in another sphere. The 
belief is brought out dimly, but beautifully, by Tennyson : — 

" Thou wilt not leave us in the dust : 

Thou madest man, he knows not why ; 
He thuiks he was not made to die ; 
And thou hast made him ; thou art just. 

* *' First Principles," p. 37. 



• 



i52 SCIENCE AND RE\'ELATIOX. 

** We have but faith ; we cannot know ; 
For knowledge is of things we see ; 
And yet we trust it comes from Thee, 
A beam in darkness : let it grow.'' 

Science opens no field to which these beliefs belong, or in 
which they can find a resting-place. Science cannot satisfy 
them. It leaves us in the dark, helpless and hopeless, on 
those ver}- points which, constituted as we are, with 
yearning affections and boundless aspirations, are of supre- 
mest importance. That ver>' theor}' of " the survival of the 
rrrrft," propounded with so much learning and ingenuity 
b\- Darwin, is here completely at fault ; for it would repre- 
sent a series of beliefs to have been developed in the mind 
which are yet useless and deceptive. No power of genius, 
no per\'erie skill of sophistr\-, can ever, even seemingly, 
reconcile these beliefs with any theory of evolution ; for if 
this be the ultimate result of the latest combinations of 
atoms, if this be all nature has done or can do for us, 
then this ultimate result is human life without adequate 
motive, " affections with no object suflScient to fill them, 
hopes of immortality never to be realised, aspirations aftei 
God and godliness never to be attained ; and thus, too, 
myriads of myriads of other nebulae may still be the poten- 
tials of delusions, and their outcomes the kingdom of 
despair."* 

But a sounder and a higher philosophy gives far other 
teaching. It tells man that those grand intuitions were not 
implanted in vain. It leads him to look beyond the mate- 
rial universe for the satisfaction of his profoundest thoughts 
and the realisation of his most earnest longings. It sees, 
exhibited in one form or another, by ever}- nation, tribe, 
and family of mankind, a feeling of dependence on some 
One greater than man, and of moral obligation to some 
One holier than man. This feeling appears with the 
earliest development of consciousness, and it grows and 
strengthens with our mental \-igour. We cannot repress it ; 
and the mind which is forced to interpret the impressions 

* Pritchard, '' Address at Brighton." 



SCIENCE AND REVELATION. 33 

received through the senses, as proofs of the reality of a 
material world, is in like manner forced to interpret the 
intuitions of dependence and moral obligation, as proofs of 
the reality of a spiritual world. And thus '' in the universal 
consciousness of innocence and guilt, of duty and disobe- 
dience, of an appeased and offended God, there is exhibited 
the instinctive confession of all mankind, that the moral 
nature of man, as subject to a law of obligation, reflects and 
represents the moral nature of a Deity by whom that obli- 
gation is imposed."* 

We now see the legitimate province of science, in which 
it reigns supreme, and beyond which it cannot pass. 
Science observes, compares, and classifies natural phe- 
nomena. It lays the whole material universe open to the 
mind. It reveals the constituent elements of rude matter, 
and the plan in which its multitudinous combinations are 
effected. It shows the wondrous structure of vegetable and 
animal organisms, and the evidences of design in them all. 
It unfolds the mechanism of the heavens, and the sublime 
simplicity of those laws which guide the stars in their 
spheres. It indicates, besides, a harmony and a unity per- 
vading nature, adapting each particle of matter — each insect, 
plant, and animal — each planet, star, and constellation — to 
its own place, and making it fulfil its own mission in the 
grand scheme of the Universe. It shows that nothing is 
defective, nothing redundant. Scientific investigation tends 
to establish the fact of oneness of design and plan in 
everything. And thus, as one of the greatest of living 
naturalists tells us, we are led to the culminating point of 
man's intellectual interpretation of nature — his recognition 
of the unity of the Power of which her phenomena are the 
diversified manifestations.*!* 

All nature's phenomena, wherever and however observed, 
direct towards a Supreme Designer and Lawgiver, whose 
existence is also recognised, as we have seen, in the primi- 
tive instincts of universal humanity. We hail Science, 

* Mansell, " Bampton Lectures," p. 113. 
t Carpenter, " Presidential Address." 
C 



34 



SCIENCE AND REVELATION. 



therefore, as a most powerful ally ; we bid her God-speed in 
her vast field of research. But we see at the same time that 
it is not within the province of science to solve any of those 
great problems which I have mentioned. They lie beyond 
her ken. The dogma of materialism which, it has been 
supposed, science confirms, utterly fails to answer the 
questions put by the philosophic mind, or to satisfy the 
longings of the human heart. Tyndall himself has been 
obliged to confess the fact. With touching pathos he says; 
in the preface to the expurgated edition of his now famous 
" Address" : — " I have noticed, during years of self-observa- 
tion, that it is not in hours of clearness and vigour that this 
doctrine (of material atheism) commends itself to my mind ; 
that in the presence of stronger and healthier thought it 
ever dissolves and disappears, as offering no solution of the 
mystery in which we dwell, and of which we form a part." 
These remarkable words, the results evidently of much and 
even painful reflection, convey a solemn warning to all 
students and teachers of science. They show the folly of 
reckless speculation, the futility of dogmatic assertion, and 
the danger of attempting to prolong the vision backward 
beyond the well-defined line of rigid observation. They 
show, too, the absolute necessity of calm, thoughtful, ex- 
haustive investigation, ere we venture to suggest a doubt, 
or propound a theory, which would have the tendency to 
unsettle earnest minds, or overthrow cherished beliefs. 



V. — The Province of Revelation. 

Little time now remains to me for considering the Province 
of Revelation. Fortunately, lengthened discussion is here 
unnecessary, for the Bible is its own best exponent. The 
one grand purpose of Revelation is to communicate to man 
those truths, a knowledge of which prepares him for a full 
discharge of his duties in life, and for an entrance into the 
kingdom of heaven. Scientific teaching does not come 
within the province of revelation. It is true, however — and 
the fact should not be lost sight of — that revealed truth 



SCIENCE AND REVELATION. 35 

touches on scientific truth at many points ; and in all such 
cases, while we are not to expect from Revelation pure 
scientific treatment, we are warranted in looking for strict 
accuracy. God's truth, as revealed, can never be at variance 
with the phenomena of God's world. So, then, the theo- 
logian must not attempt to intrude his dogmas into the 
field of science, so as to stifle free thought, or limit indepen- 
dent and legitimate research. Free as the air we breathe, 
free as the light of heaven, must the scientist be left to pro- 
secute his noble studies in the vast realms of nature. 

Revelation does not give a scientific cosmology. That 
lies outside its province. But then, just where science stops 
short, unable to solve one of the grandest problems of 
nature — the origin of matter and of the material universe — 
Revelation steps in to supplement its teaching. Science, as 
we have seen, points to the great truth that there must be 
a Creator, though it cannot of itself reach to it ; Revelation 
confirms and crowns that truth with the simple and sublime 
declaration, "In the beginning GOD created the heaven and 
the earth." 

Revelation does not treat systematically or philosophically 
of "force" and "motion;" but it indicates that solution of 
their ultimate origin, in a living omnipotent Being, which 
the highest philosophy points to. We read in the first 
chapter of Genesis, " The Spirit of God moved upon the face 
of the waters" — representing, as it seems to me, that 
Almighty Being as the quickening principle of the Uni- 
verse. 

Revelation does not touch on geology ; but it leaves room 
for the fullest development of the successive strata of the 
earth's crust, even though it could be proven that millions 
of years had been occupied in their formation. " /// tJie 
beginning God created the heaven and the earth." No date 
is given. The simple fact oi creation is affirmed, in opposi- 
tion to any idea of development or material atheism ; but 
myriads of ages may have intervened between that " be- 
ginning" and the creation of man. Then, again, the his- 
torical record of creation which follows seems to lia\'c a 



36 SCIENCE AND REVELATION. 

scientific basis, as if the writer, by a Divine prescience, had 
anticipated the results of modern research. He tells us 
how the lowest forms of life were first made, and how there 
was a gradual progression up to man, the last and lord 
of all 

Revelation does not enter into the mysteries of molecular 
physics, or the development of the life-germ, or the way in 
which it operates on material organisms. All these it rele- 
gates to science, whose function it is to investigate them. 
There is, however, one mystery which science cannot reach 
— the origin of life ; and here again Revelation makes a 
clear and full discovery. That brief account of the creation 
of Adam, given in the second chapter of Genesis, assumes 
a new significancy when read in the light of the most recent 
discoveries of science. Chemistry has demonstrated, as we 
have seen, that the whole constituent elements of our bodies 
— in fact, of all organised bodies — are identical with those 
in the material world around us ; and science, as we have 
also seen, indicates that the life-principle must be something 
entirely different from those material elements. The record 
contained in Genesis is here in complete accord with science, 
so far as science can go : — "And the Lord God formed man 
of the dust of the growid!' Had the writer of these remark- 
able words heard the recent statements of those eminent 
scientists. Professors Pritchard and Huxley, he could not 
have been more scientifically accurate. Huxley says of the 
matter of our bodies, that it is " the clay of the potter ; 
which, bake it and paint it as he will, remains clay, separated 
by artifice, and not by nature, from the commonest brick 
or sun-dried clod."* Again, the sacred writer records man's 
inevitable doom — " In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat 
bread, //// thou return unto the ground : for dust thou art, 
and unto dust shalt thou return;^' and Professor Huxley, 
all unconsciously no doubt, re-echoes the words of the 
inspired scientist — " Under whatever disguise it takes 
refuge — whether fungus or oak, worm or man — the living 
protoplasm ultimately dies and is resolved to its viineral 

* " Lay Sermons," p- 129 



SCIENCE AND REVELATION. 37 

and lifeless constituents T''^ And the sacred writer does 
not stop here. He goes on to add what science might 
infer, but could not reach, as to the origin and implanting 
of life itself — " The Lord God .... breathed into 
his nostrils the breath of life : and man became a living 
soul."t 

Revelation gives no detailed or systematised account of 
the various species of animals that exist on the earth, nor 
does it profess to enter into questions of structure, descent, 
or development. All this is outside its province ; and it 
never interferes with the researches of the naturalist. It 
authoritatively declares a great general truth, however, 
which all the recondite theories of Darwin cannot over- 
throw, and which the profoundest studies of the physiologist 
tend to indicate and confirm — that each species was brought 
into existence by the distinct fiat of the Almighty Creator. 

In approaching the highest problems which occupy 
human thought — the origin, duty, and destiny of man, and 
the existence and nature of God — Revelation becomes fuller 
and clearer. Where science utterly fails to satisfy our 
wants and aspirations, where philosophy sheds but a faint 
and flickering ray. Revelation shines with a greater than 
noon-day splendour. The origin of intellect and conscience, 
with all their mysterious conceptions of law, obligation, a 
future state, and a holy God, is embodied in one pregnant 
sentence — " So God created man in His oivn imaged % Here 
are revealed the essential personality and omnipotence of 
God ; and, as flowing from them, the personality, knowledge, 
self-consciousness, moral feeling, and immortality of man, 
who was made " in the image of God." Of these sublime 
truths, in all their wondrous development. Revelation be- 
comes the complete and sole exponent ; and eveiy new 
phase of truth set forth by it — whether of law, or morals, or 
worship, or faith, or love, — finds such a responsive echo in 
our own deepest feelings and loftiest aspirations, that w c 
instinctively bow before it as a message replete with the 
infinite wisdom of God. While science disappoints our 

■'^ " Lay Sermons," p. 131. + Ccu. ii. 7. + Cicn. i. 27. 



38 SCIENCE AND REVELATION. 

most momentous inquiries, while philosophy leaves an 
aching void in the human heart, Revelation fulfils all our 
wishes, and satisfies all our hopes. 

By the testimony of some of the greatest men who 
have shed the lustre of genius upon the walks of science 
— Newton and Herschel, Guizot and Pritchard, Brew- 
ster and Chalmers — the Bible has been shoAvn to be 
in full harmony with the facts of science. But it has 
a far higher claim upon our faith than even scientific 
testimony can give it. It develops an ethical code, purer 
and nobler than ever emanated from the schools of the 
world. It inspires man with a holy ardour, a self-denying, 
self-sacrificing love, such as philosophers never dreamt 
of. It reveals to the eye of faith that other world after 
which our higher nature longs. It shows us that the 
consciousness of immortality, which haunts us here like 
a dream, is not a delusion, but a glorious reality. It 
enables us to look through the gloomy vista of this 
earth's labours and sorrows, to another, where labour 
shall have its full reward, and sorrow shall be unknown. 
It shows, away beyond the tomb, a life, peaceful, 
happy, glorious, for which the life on earth, with its limi- 
tations and disappointments, its ceaseless struggles and 
unfulfilled desires, is only the school of preparation. It 
opens before us a sphere where the perfect knowledge after 
which we here vainly toil, and the perfect happiness after 
which we here as vainly strive, shall be fully and for ever 
realised. There is nothing in science or philosophy like 
this. There is no power in them to make man so wise, so 
useful, so holy. There is no discovery of science which can 
bring life and immortality to light. There is no scientific 
agency which can conquer death, and throw wide the gates 
of Paradise to the disembodied spirit. In breadth of true 
knowledge, in sublimity of discovery, in ennobling, quicken- 
ing power, philosophy and science sink into complete in- 
significance before this grand Revelation of God. 



'•^Jh, 7^ . 



4 Mmi%, 



Dr. MOORE, Glasnevin. 



THE STRUCTURE, &c., OF PLANTS 



• • •^^^- t • 



I.— INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 

DURING the latter half of the sixteenth century, John 
Ray, an English divine, wrote a discourse, as he calls 
it, in Latin, on " the wisdom of God manifested in the works 
of the creation ;" and for his text he took the well-known 
24th verse of the 104th Psalm — " O Lord, how manifold 
are Thy works ! in wisdom hast Thou made them all." If 
I could to-night cull and translate freely from this book the 
arguments and observations which he so ably brings to bear 
on his subject, they would prove much more effectual and 
convincing than anything I can offer of my own accord. 
In the preface to the work, the author, in stating his reasons 
for writing it, mentions, first, that the belief in a Deity is 
the foundation of all religion ; for he that cometh to God 
must believe that He is God. It is, therefore, a matter of the 
highest concernment to be firmly settled and established in 
a full persuasion of this main point. Now this must be 
demonstrated by arguments drawn from the light of nature 
and works of creation ; for divinity, like all other sciences, 
proves not, but supposes its subjects, taking it for granted 
that, by natural light, men are sufficiently convinced of the 
being of a Deity. Secondly, not only to demonstrate the 
being of a Deity, but also to illustrate some of His principal 
attributes, as, namely. His infinite power and wisdom. The 
vast multitude of creatures — and those not only small, but 
immensely great — the sun, moon, and all the heavenly hosts, 
are effects and proofs of His almighty power. " The heavens 
declare the glory of God, and the firmament shcweth forth 
His handiwork." The admirable contrivance of all and 
each of them ; the adapting all the parts of animals to their 



4 THE STRUCTURE, ETC., OF PLANTS. 

several uses ; the provision that is made for their sustenance, 
which is often taken notice of in Scripture — '' The eyes ot 
all wait upon Thee ; Thou givest them their meat in due 
season ; Thou openest Thy hand, and satisfieth the desire 
of every living thing ; " — their mutual subserviency to each 
other, and unanimous conspiring to promote and carry on 
the public good, are evident demonstrations of His sovereign 
wisdom. Such are some of the reasons given by this 
good man for undertaking the work I have mentioned, 
and wherein he so ably demonstrates the power, wisdom, 
and goodness of the Almighty. He also grapples with and 
condemns the Aristotelian hypothesis, which seems to have 
been to some extent prevalent in his time — namely, that 
the world was co-eternal with God ; also, the Epicurean 
hypothesis, that the world was made by a casual concurrence 
and cohesion of atoms ; and Descartes' assertion, in his 
'' Principles of Philosophy," that the ends of God in any of 
His works are equally undiscovered by us. 



II.— DESIGN AND ADAPTATION IN SEEDS, ROOTS, 
STEMS, AND LEAVES OF PLANTS. 

As I am unable to illustrate the arguments of Ray on all 
the various topics mentioned, I think it will be more prudent 
for me to confine myself chiefly to the subject I am best 
acquainted with, and endeavour to show preconcerted 
design and infinite wisdom in the vegetable kingdom. In 
the outset, we must see and acknowledge the wisdom and 
power of God, in clothing the earth with such kinds of 
plants as are best adapted for the use of man and other 
animals which inhabit the difterent parts of the globe where 
these particular kinds are most required, and also in the 
power they possess of purifying the pestilential air breathed 
forth by animals, and produced by combustion into an 
atmosphere of life. Even in the almost universal colouring 
of plants, infinite wisdom is evinced, green being that 
colour on which the eye can longest look without tiring. 
We find a chemical substance diffused through the sap of 



1 



SEEDS, ROOTS, STEMS, AND LEAVES. 5 

nearly all plants — namely, chlorophyll, which, on being 
exposed to light, turns green. 

In farther considering this matter, it may probably 
suit our purpose to take a brief review of the various 
organs of plants and their uses in the life of the indi- 
vidual, which will enable us to make remarks suitable 
to our subject on each. In following this plan, we shall 
commence with the seed, which contains the germ of the 





Kidney Bean Germinating, 
a Radicle. b Plumule. c Fleshy Cotyledons. 

future plant. In this we may readily observe order and 
regulation, the work of some intelligent being, in furnishing 
sustenance for the young germ which is contained within the 
seed, either in the substance called albumen (but properly 
perisperm), or, when that is wanting, by large fleshy cotyle- 
donary leaves. These support the young embryo until it 
germinates and extends its roots in the earth to draw 
nourishment therefrom. It has, however, been remarked 
that it is not when the seed bursts its coats, or the egg- 
shell is broken by the young chick, or the animal is born, 
that life begins ; for the seed, the embryo or foetus, had a 
previous existence more or less independent of, or con- 
nected with the parent, according to species. We are un- 
able, by the aid of the most powerful instruments, to per- 
ceive the moment when the first embryo cell receives that 
impress which has irrevocably determined the form which 
the perfect being is to assume within these narrow limits, 
and which neither impregnation nor any other physical in- 
fluence can make it exceed. And if life is once stopped, no 
force that is yet known can set it in motion again. In the 
case of seeds, it may remain dormant for a long succession 
of years, its action may be limited or imperceptible, until 



THE STRUCTURE, ETC., OF PLANTS. 



recalled into operation by the necessary' amount of certain 
elements — namely, heat, moisture, and air, which are 
requisite for germination. We thus see how wisely the 
embr}-o of the plant is provided for, until germination takes 
place, when the root invariably strikes doAvn wards to the 
earth and seeks darkness, while the stem is elevated and 
points towards the light, so that each may be in their 

proper spheres ; and, 
as Dr. Lindley re- 
marks, no known 
power has yet been 
found to overcome 
these tendencies. In 
the root we see evi- 
dent design for the 
nourishment and sup- 
port of the plant. In 
the first place it de- 
rives nourishment 
from the seed-leaves 
until it enters its pro- 
per element, where it 
is soon enabled to pro- 
vide for itself, and sup- 
port the individual de- 
pending on it. Thou- 
sands of mouths are 
soon opened to absorb 
the food from the 
earth, bv the minute cellular hairs with which the roots of all 
plants are more or less covered ; though they are invisible to 
the naked eye, they are easily discovered by the aid of a simple 
lens or microscope. The young points of the rootlets are con- 
stantly receiving additions of new cellular matter to their 
extremities, which enables them to extend in every direction 
in search of food, and fix the individual to which they 
belonor steadfastlv to the earth. In countries which are 
subject to long droughts, the roots of plants frequently 




Plant Germinating. 

o Plumule, vrith Cotyledon. 

6 Collet, line of junction between Stem and Root. 

c Root. 



SEEDS, ROOTS, STEMS, AND LEAVES. 



acquire a thick fleshy form, and assume various shapes, 
which enables them to withstand dryness for long periods, 
where plants with only fibrous roots would perish. These 
fleshy underground stems or roots, as they are som.etimes 
called, often contain the nutritious substances which we 
feed on ; for example, the potato, arrow-root, yam, sweet 
potato, Tarro, &c. They sometimes contain fluids which 
quench the most burning 
thirst. In the natural 
progress of their growth, 
roots are constantly 
pushing forward, either 
vertically or horizontally, 
arriving gradually at 
fresh portions of soil 
from which the nutritive 
matters have not been 
absorbed ; and as a con- 
stant relation is preserved 
between the spreading of 
the branches and the 
spreading of the roots in 
various kinds of trees, 
the rain which falls on 
the tree drops from the 
leaves at the exact dis- 
tances where the young 
spongioles of the rootlets 

are in greatest abundance ready to absorb it. We have 
here, as Dr. Roget observes, a striking instance of 
that beautiful correspondence which has been established 
between processes belonging to different departments 
of nature, and which are made to concur in the produc- 
tion of remote effects, that could never have been ac- 
complished without these preconcerted and harmonious 
adjustments. Our admiration cannot fail to be excited 
when we contemplate the manner in which a large tree is 
chained to the earth by its powerful and widcly-sprcach'ng 




Tubercular Root of Dahlia. 



8 THE STRUCTURE, ETC., OF PLANTS. 

roots. By the firm hold which they take of the ground, 
they produce the most ettectual resistance to the force of 
the wind, which, acting on so large a surface as that pre- 
sented by the branches covered with dense foliage, must 
possess an immense mechanical power. As the roots 
penetrate downwards into the earth to different distances, in 
order to procure the requisite nourishment, so the stem 
grows upwards for the purpose of obtaining for the leaves 
and flowers an ample supply of air and the influence of a 
brighter light, both of which are of the highest importance 
to vegetable life. We shall therefore pass from the roots 
to the stem, and briefly consider the latter in its anatomical 
and physiological characters. Here we find the gradual 
lengthening of the cellular structure into long tough tubes, 
called vascular tissue, as channels for the conv^eyance of the 
sap from the roots to its destination ; and in the physical 
process of endosmotic action, by which the circulation of 
the sap is propelled through these capillar}'- tubes, which 
also contain the necessary amount of air required for the 
process of vegetable life — all proving design and not chance. 
The lowly herb and the lofty tree grow in the same way, 
the diflerence being only in size and duration. The stems 
of the plants of a ver>- large section of the vegetable king- 
dom are covered with a bark to protect them from outward 
injuries, and also to enable the physiological functions of 
life to be carried on. The very structure of this bark being 
composed of three distinct layers, each having its proper 
use, is suggestive of wisdom, by adaptation to an end or 
purpose. The form of the stem may also be taken into 
consideration In nearly all plants this form is cylindrical, 
angular-stemmed plants being of rare occurrence. 

We may ask, Is there no design in this ? Here we have 
the form known to engineers which has the greatest strength 
with the least resisting surface. On this account, it is said, 
the idea of the Eddystone lighthouse was suggested by the 
form of the stem of a palm tree. If the stems of trees had 
been square, in place of round, they could not have \\ith- 
stood the violent hurricanes they are often exposed to. 



SEEDS, ROOTS, STEMS, AND LEAVES. 9 

without being blown down by the wind. The many aesthetic 
uses of the stems of plants I shall be obliged here to pass 
over, and next consider the leaves, which are the most 
important organs, both physiologically and morphologically. 
In no other part of the plant is design so strongly manifested 
as in the leaves. Were it only for the refreshing shade they 
afford, particularly in warm countries, we see how essential 
they are for our comfort and delight, circumstances which 
have been noticed from the remotest periods that any 
mention is made of trees. Hence that expression so often 
repeated from Scripture, " Every man sitting under his own 
vine and under his own fig tree." It would also seem that 
the ancients were in the habit of eating under trees, as 
appears from Abraham's entertaining the angels under a 
tree, and standing by them while they did eat. Gen. xviii. 8. 
It is, however, when we examine their wonderful mechanism 
that we can form a just appreciation of their adaptations 
to the functions they have to perform. To the naked eye, 
a leaf of a tree appears a solid body, contained within a 
skin or cuticle ; but to the vegetable anatomist it is known 
to consist of two distinct layers, soldered firmly together in 
life, but after death separable into two halves. Were this 
not the case, the functions of the elaboration of the sap 
which circulates through the stems to the leaves could not 
be carried on. 

I cannot here enter into the physiology of these func- 
tions, but I shall briefly mention the apparatus by which 
they are principally effected. By looking at the leaf of 
a tree, it is seen to be traversed from the stalk to the 
apex, and from one margin to the other, by a wonderful 
contrivance of veins, which botanists designate as vascular 
tissue, appearing to the naked eye like the meshes of a net, 
the meshes being filled up with a softer substance called 
cellular tissue. It is these cords of vascular veins which 
give form to leaves, according as they spread from the 
strong central vein or midrib to the sides. If a small portion 
of the leaf be laid on the table of a microscope, and viewed 
through a half or quarter-inch lens, the marvellousl}- beau- 



10 



THE STRUCTURE, ETC., OF PLANTS. 




Section of Leaf, with Stomatesi 
a Stomates. 



tiful structure will command our admiration. Hundreds 
of small openings leading from the exterior to the interior 
of the leaf will be revealed, through which the vital functions 

of respiration and transpira- 
tion are carried on, in a man- 
ner somewhat analogous to 
similar functions as they are 
effected through the lungs of 
animals. These stomates, as 
they are called, enable the 
plant, when acted on by 
solar light, to decompose the 
carbonic acid in the sap, 
and secrete solid carbon, 
w^hich latter constitutes so 
large a portion of the vege- 
table structure. It is by this action also that the vital 
air which supports animal life is chiefly purified. One of 
the most beautiful provisions known in nature is, that the 
deleterious air breathed forth by animals is purified and ren- 
dered salubrious by plants ; if it were otherwise, the globe 
would become uninhabitable. But, as Dr. Lindley observes, 
every leaf, every blade of grass — nay, the finest of those 
green silken confervoid threads which we see so abundantly 
floating in streams and pools of water — is incessantly occu- 
pied during daylight in effecting this most important change 
of pestilential air into an atmosphere of life. In the greater 
number of plants these vital cells or stomates are mostly con- 
fined to the under surfaces of leaves, but in water-plants they 
are mostly on the upper surface ; were it otherwise, they 
could not perform the functions for which they are destined. 
Their numbers and size vary greatly in different kinds of 
plants, being sometimes as many as 70,000 to one square 
inch of the leaf 

Such being a brief statement of the apparatus in leaves for 
carrying on the life of the plant, he must indeed be a stolid 
individual who cannot perceive wisdom and design of the 
highest order in all this cohesion of atoms. Again, how 



THE MORPHOLOGY OF LEAVES. 



11 



exquisitely beautiful and how manifold are the forms of 
leaves. In the whole vegetable kingdom, no two different 
species of plants have their leaves similar ; even in the same 
individual, scarcely two leaves are exactly alike — some 
larger, some smaller, and so on. It is not too much to 
suppose that all this wonderful change of form and of 
colouring was intended by the Creator to gratify and 
please the senses of His creatures. Had there been only 
one form of leaf, however beautiful that may have been, the 
eye would have soon become wearied with beholding it. 



IIL— DESIGN AND ADAPTATION IN THE MORPHOLOGY 

OF LEAVES. 

In considering the forms of leaves, we are led to one of 
the principal topics of our subject — viz., what is termed the 
morphology of leaves — which enables us to account for the 
peculiar forms that these remarkable plants assume, which 
have lately been designated carnivorous plants, and which 
have caused so much amazement among the readers of the 
" Graphic," arising from the curious representations of them 
in that popular periodical. It is not only in this country 
they have received marked attention, but also in America, 
where admirably written articles have appeared in the 
New York " Nation," and other newspapers published by 
our transatlantic cousins, on insect-devouring plants, during 
the early part of the present year, written chiefly by Pro- 
fessor Asa Gray, of Boston, U.S. Dr. Hooker, as you are all 
aware, made this the subject of the opening address which he 
delivered in this town last August to the biological section 
of the British Association; and so admirably did he delineate 
the peculiarities of these plants, that he kept one of the 
most crowded audiences I ever was present in, almost spell- 
bound during the whole course of his address. The two 
gentlemen I have named have thrashed the subject pretty 
well out, and consequently I shall not have much that is 
novel to communicate to you this evening on it. Although 
these plants have long been known to capture insects in 



12 



THE STRUCTURE, ETC., OF PLANTS. 



their morphologised leaves, it is to the researches of Mr. 
Darwin that we principally owe our knowledge of their carni- 
vorous propensities, though that was pretty well ascertained 
by the Americans many years ago. 

Regarding that most expert of fly-catchers, DioncBa mus- 
ciptda, about which so much has been written and so little 
known until lately, Ellis, in his correspondence with 

Linnseus, describes the structure and 
action of its living trap. He notices 
that the power of irritability which 
caused the movement, making the trap 
to close, resided in the few bristles which 
are on the upper face of the leaves 
among the glands, which latter produce 
the bait for the unhappy insect that 
becomes its prey. From these exudes 
a sweetish liquid, which the animal is 
tempted to taste, and in doing so, touches 
those springs or bristles on the surface. 
The trap then instantly closes, and the 
spines either transfix the insect or fold it in 
their fatal embrace, as firmly as ever the 
legs of a rat were held in a trap, the ordi- 
nary kinds of which that are now used 
so nearly resemble the halves of the 
leaf of this plant. It has, however, 
been lately ascertained that the liquid 
glands on the leaf does not appear 
until the trap has been closed on some unhappy insect, 
and has held it there for several hours. It is rather con- 
sidered that insects are attracted to the trap by some peculiar 
odour emitted. Within one or two days after the capture 
has taken place, this liquid becomes abundant, macerat- 
ing the body of the perished insect. Its analogy is not with 
water, but rather gastric juice, which, like the latter, has an 
acid reaction. I have long known those plants in a culti- 
vated state, and have had many opportunities of observing 
them ; but it is only when the plant is vigorous and the 




Leaf and Trap of 

Dioncea. 

a Leaf. 

b Trap Appendage. 

secreted by the 



THE MORPHOLOGY OF LExVVES. 13 

atmosphere warm that their trap movements are quick. When 
the leaves are weak or the conservatory cold where they are 
grown, the traps close very gradually ; but when the leaves 
are strong, and supplied with sufficient heat, the movement is 
instantaneous. According to the articles in the American 
newspapers which I have already alluded to, the nature of 
this liquid was first ascertained by Dr. Curtis, who had 
opportunities of making observations on the Dioncea in its 
native habitats. At times he found the entrapped insects 
enveloped in a mucilaginous consistence, which seemed to 
act as a solvent, the insect being more or less consumed by 
it. The observations made by Dr. Curtis were followed up 
by a Mr. Canby, who discovered that the fluid is always 
poured out around the captive insects in due time, if the 
leaf be in good condition and the prey suitable ; also, that 
it comes from the leaf itself, and not from the decompos- 
ing insect. He laid on the leaves bits of raw beef, and 
these, though sometimes rejected, were generally acted 
on like insects — the traps closed down tightly on the 
crumbs, which became covered over with the liquid, dis- 
solved mainly and absorbed by the leaves. He, however, 
gave the plant a fatal dyspepsia by feeding it with cheese. 
Most of the foregoing observations have been confirmed by 
that excellent observer, Mr. Darwin, who has for some 
years had the subject under his investigation, and who has 
found that the leaves of Dioncea absorbed particles of 
muscle and other animal matter, but were insensible to par- 
ticles of inorganic matter. In this we have indeed a subject 
for contemplation, and we may well be reverently led to ask 
ourselves, who gave this plant these remarkable peculiarities 
and propensities 1 It will be found rather difficult to explain 
them on the evolution principle. It is, however, to be clearly 
understood that this digestive matter in the plant, dissolving 
the insects which it captures, is in no way identical with the 
action of the stomachs of animals in digesting their food ; 
it is only in some way analogous to that operation. 

The American plant is not the only one which the Author 
of nature has endowed with the power of entrapping insects 



14 THE STRUCTURE, ETC., OF PLANTS. 

in a similar manner by the leaves. We have, in our bogs 
all over Ireland, plants belonging to the same natural family 
as the DioncEa, which catch insects also, though not so 
expertly. They are called " Sundews," in English, which 
name is derived from the beautiful glistening appearance the 
numerous glandular hairs on their leaves have when the 
sun shines brightly on them. Our bogs furnish three 
species, all of which capture various kinds of insects. 
They spread out from their base a circle of small leaves, the 
upper faces of which are beset with glands, and their margins 
are fringed with long stiff hairs, each tipped by a secreting 
gland, which produces, while in a vigorous state, a globule 
of clear liquid, like a drop of dew. A touch shows that the 
glistening drops are glutinous, as flies become aware to their 
cost, when they are tempted to alight and sip the liquid. A 
fly once entangled among those tenacious hairs begins a 
struggle to get free, but the more he struggles the more he 
becomes enwrapped among them. This was known to be 
the case by Roth, a German botanist of the last century, who 
states the telling fact, that not only the bristles with which 
the unfortunate insect has come flrst in contact, but also the 
surrounding ones, which had been at first widely-spreading, 
curved inward one by one, although they had not been touched, 
so as within a few hours to press their gelatinous tips likewise 
against the body of the captive insect. It is now supposed 
that it is through these surfaces some part of the animal 
matter is imbibed by the plant. Roth at that early period 
surmised that they were predaceous, having observed that 
the disc of the Drosera leaf often became concave and 
enveloped the prey. These circumstances, although men- 
tioned so long ago, were either ignored or mostly forgotten, 
until they have again been verified and more light thrown 
on them by Mr. Darwin, who not only confirmed all Roth's 
observations, but also found that the bristly leaves responded 
equally to a bit of muscle or animal substance. Other in- 
dependent observers have been working at the same class of 
phenomena in different parts of the world. In the American 
*' Journal of Science," for November, 1871, some of the ex- 



. THE MORPHOLOGY OF LEAVES. 15 

periments of Mrs. Treat of New Jersey with these plants are 
noticed. These experiments were afterwards pubhshed in the 
December number of the American " NaturaHst," from 
which we shall here transcribe. Mrs. Treat selected a 
particular day in July, when the leaves of the Sundew were 
unusually active ; for, like those of Dioncea, they vary much 
by the state of the weather in the way of appetising. She 
writes as follows : — "At 10.15 a-^i- of the same day, I placed 
bits of raw beef on some of the most vigorous leaves of 
Drosera longifolia. At 12.10, ten of the leaves had folded 
around the beef, hiding it from sight. At 11.30 on same 
day, I placed living flies on the leaves of Drosera longifolia. 
At 12.48, one of the leaves had folded entirely round its 
victim ; the other leaves had partially folded, and the flies 
had ceased to struggle. At 2.30, four leaves had each 
folded round a fly. I tried mineral substances, bits of dry 
chalk, magnesia, and pebbles. In twenty-four hours neither 
the leaves nor the bristles had made any move like clasping 
these articles. I then wet a piece of chalk in water, and in 
less than an hour the bristles were curving around it ; but 
they soon unfolded again, leaving the chalk free on the 
blade of the leaf" Parallel experiments made on the round- 
leaved Sundew (Drosera rotundifolia) gave similar results ; 
but when Mrs. Treat tried raw apple on the leaves, 
she found that although the bristles curved towards it, it 
took eleven hours before they touched it ; and they did not 
adhere to the apple so firmly as they did to the beef More 
recent experiments have been made at the suggestion of 
Mr. Darwin, and it has been found that when a fly alights 
upon a leaf a little below its apex, or when a bit of crushed 
fly is there affixed, within a few hours the tip of the leaf 
bends at the point, and contracts and curves over or around 
the body in question ; and Mrs. Treat even found that when 
living flies were pinned at the distance of half-an-inch from 
the leaves, these in forty minutes had bent their tips per- 
ceptibly towards the flies, and in less than two hours reached 
them ! We may here remark that if these observations be 
really confirmed by future investigation, the leaves of these 



16 



THE STRUCTURE, ETC., OF PLANTS. 



plants would seem to indicate purpose nearly as manifest 
as that of the spider's web. They, however, require to be 
carefully repeated. There are many other kinds of Sundews, 
which grow in different parts of the world, but chiefly in 
New Holland and at the Cape of Good Hope, all of which 
are armed with apparatus for catching insects, which they 
invariably do. One very remarkable and beautiful plant, 
which grows in Portugal, and belongs to the, family of 
Drosera, though not a species of that genus, affords a fine 
example of its power for attracting and capturing small 
flies, &c. It is called Drosophylhim lusitainacm, and has 
long linear leaves, which are so closely beset with glandular 
hairs as to render them objects of great beauty, especially 
when viewed towards bright light. The number of insects 
this plant captures is so great as to render the leaves nearly 
black at times ; these insects do not consist of small flies only, 
but I have occasionally seen rather large moths sticking on 
them. Like the Droserce, the glands adjacent to those 
on which the insect is caught bend towards the strug- 
gling creature, and entangle it the more. 

The next group of curious plants which show design in 
their morphologised leaves are the Sarracenice, or " side- 
saddle plants," as they are sometimes called in this country. 
In America they are better known under the name of 
" huntsman's caps." In these there is no contractile action 
similar to that in the former group, but the construction of 
the trap is such as to make the capture of insects more cer- 
tain. They Avere well explained by Dr. Hooker in his late 
lecture in Belfast, but some new facts have since been ascer- 
tained which warrant me in again referring to the matter. 

The leaves of the Sarracenics are hollow, and form 
pitchers or trumpet-shaped tubes, containing liquid in which 
flies and other insects are trapped and drowned. They are 
all natives of America, and grow in bogs or low ground, so 
that they cannot be supposed to stand in need of water. 
In some of the kinds, the apex of the leaf is open, so that 
water and insects may drop in at once ; but in others the 
point of the leaf curves over the opening like a hood, and 



THE MORPHOLOGY OF LEAVES. 



17 



prevents the free access of water. The interior of the 
tubular leaves is closely beset with bristly hairs, which point 
in a downward direction to the base of the tube. This is 
particularly the case near the mouth ; but farther down, near 
the base, they are either 
short or disappear alto- 
gether. The effect of 
this will be rendered 
apparent as we proceed 
in describing the manner 
insects are entrapped. 

Like the Dionecs and 
DrosercB, natural history 
facts connected with the 
SarracenicE were report- 
ed about the end of the 
last century, but they 
appeared so incredible, 
that they were either 
overlooked or forgotten, 
until the matter has 
been renewed lately. Dr. 
James Macbrideof South 
Carolina, the early asso- 
ciate of Elliot, whom I 
have already mentioned 
as having been an active 
and voluminous correspondent of Linnaeus, sent to Sir James 
Smith an account of his observations made on this subject 
in 1 8 10, which was read to the Linnaean Society, London, 
in 1815, and published, in Vol. XH. of their "Transactions." 
The observations relate chiefly to Sarracenia adiinca, which 
is said to be the most efficient fly-catcher among them in its 
natural habitat, though certainly not so in cultivation, so 
far as my experience extends. The pitchers of the two 
large kinds, S. Jlava and 5. purpurea, contain quadruple 
the quantity of dead flies and other insects that those of 

Sarracenia variolaris (aduuca) contain. Dr. IVIacbridc in 
B 




Sarracenia flava. 



18 THE STRUCTURE, ETC., OF PLANTS. 

this communication states, that " in the month of May, June, 
or July, when the leaves of these plants perform their 
extraordinary functions in the greatest perfection, if some 
of them be removed to a house and fixed in an erect posi- 
tion, it will soon be perceived that flies are attracted by 
them. These insects immediately approach the hollow 
tubes of the leaves, and, leaning over their edges, appear to 
sip with eagerness something from their internal surfaces. 
In this position they linger, but at length, allured, as it 
would seem, by the pleasure of taste, they enter the tubes. 
The fly, which has thus changed its situation, will be seen to 
stand unsteadily ; it totters for a few seconds, and falls to 
the bottom of the tube, when it is either drowned or 
attempts in vain to ascend against the points of the hairs 
in the tube. In a house much infested with flies, the en- 
trapment goes on so rapidly, that a leaf is filled in a few 
hours, and it becomes necessary to add water, the natural 
quantity being insuflicient to drown the imprisoned in- 
sects." The cause which attracts flies is evidently a 
sweet viscid substance resembling honey, secreted by, or 
exuding from the internal surface of the tube. From the 
margin, where it commences, it does not extend lower than 
one-fourth of an inch. The falling of the insect is wholly 
attributable to the downward or inverted pointing of the hairs 
lining the inner surface of the leaf, till, at or quite near the 
surface covered by the bait, they are no longer perceptible 
to the naked eye, or to the most delicate touch. It is here 
that the fly cannot take a hold sufficiently strong to support 
itself, but falls. 

Farther evidence on this curious and interesting subject 
has lately been afforded by Dr. i\Iellichamp, who. Dr. 
Hooker remarked, is now resident in the district where 
Dr. Macbride made his observations. He has investigated 
the fluid which is found at the bottom of the tubes, and 
satisfied himself that it was really secreted. It is described 
as being mucilaginous, but leaving in the mouth a peculiar 
astringency. Although he does not attribute any true 
digestive power to this fluid, he found it had a remarkable 



THE MORPHOLOGY OF LEAVES. 19 

anaesthetic effect upon flies immersed in it. He states that 
a fly when thrown into water is very apt to escape, as the 
fluid seems to run from its wings, but it never escapes from 
the Sarracenia secretion. Ants seem to fall victims oftener 
than flies, as their decomposing bodies, according to Dr. 
Mellichamp's observation, form the principal bulk of the 
mass found in these pitchers. One remarkable fact is 
mentioned by that gentleman — namely, that he never 
found the honey bee or other melliferce about these plants. 
So far as I can recollect, my observations on those under 
cultivation would lead me to corroborate Dr. Mellichamp. 
I never observed our honey-making bee approach the 
SarracenicB or Nepenthes in our conservatories ; nor did I 
ever find their dead bodies in the pitchers, though I have 
often found the bodies of wasps in great abundance in them, 
and have seen these insects enter. More recent observations 
might lead us to suppose that all this beautiful arrangement 
and adaptation may be necessary, and wisely designed, for 
keeping up certain links in the chain of insect life. Although 
fatal to nearly all of that tribe which approach the lure 
held out for them, there are yet some species which are 
proof against its siren influences, and oblige these plants, 
either directly or indirectly, to support them. One, a little 
glossy moth, which has at present received from the Ameri- 
cans the trivial name of the Sarracenia moth, is stated to 
live and breed in the pitchers. It is said to walk with 
perfect impunity over their inner surface, which proves 
treacherous to many other insects. It is often found in 
pairs within these pitchers soon after they open in the early 
part of the season, or about the end of April. The female 
lays her eggs singly near the mouth of the pitchers, and the 
young larva, from the moment of hatching, spins for itself a 
carpet of silk, and very soon closes up the mouth of the 
pitcher, by drawing the rims together, and covering them 
with a delicate gossamer-like web, which effectually debars 
all outside intruders. It then frets the leaf within, com- 
mencing under the hood, and feeding downwards on the 
cellular tissue, leaving only the epidermis. As it proceeds, 



20 THE STRUCTURE, ETC., OF PLANTS. 

the lower part of the pitcher, above the putrescent insect 
collection, becomes packed with ochreous excrementitious 
droppings ; and by the time the worm has attained its full 
size, the portion of the pitcher above these droppings gene- 
rally collapses. A small woodcut of this insect and its larva 
may be seen in the number of " Nature" for October 8, with 
the article in question copied from the New York " Tribune." 

The second species is a more invariable living accom- 
paniment to the Sarracenice mentioned. It is a legless 
grub, about the size of the base of a goose quill, which riots 
among the putrid insect remains, and when fed to repletion, 
bores through the leaf just above the petiole, and burrows 
in the ground. Here it contracts to the pupa state, and in 
a few days issues as a large two-winged fly. These two 
species are stated to be the only insects of any size yet 
known to invade these death-dealing traps. The only other 
species which seems at home in the leaf is a small mite. 

Along with the SarracenicB, I have yet to notice, in 
this part of our subject, another very remarkable plant, 
which has also morphologised leaves adapted for capturing 
insects. It is the Californian " side-saddle plant," Darling- 
tonia Californica, named in honour of Dr. Darlington of 
Pennsylvania, and belonging to the same natural family 
of plants as the Sarracenics. In it the leaves all rise 
from the base, the adult ones varying from a foot to i8 
inches long in strong plants. They are tubular, the tube 
gradually tapering downwards, and singularly twisted on 
the axis ; arched and vaulted at the summit into a sac, 
about the size of a hen's ^gg, on the under side of which is 
an orifice opening into the hollow tubular cavity of the 
pitcher. Over this cavity are two long highly-coloured 
lobes, which Dr. Torrey, in describing this plant, very 
aptly compares to the lop ears of some varieties of 
rabbit. This attractive flag, which is no doubt suspended 
and designed for attracting insects, is smeared with a 
honied sweet exudation on the inner surface (as may be 
seen from the specimen on the table), and was first noticed 
by Professor Asa Gray ; thus a farther lure is provided for 



THE MORPHOLOGY OF LEAVES. 21 

effecting the end for which these peculiar pitchers are 
formed. 

Dr. Hooker, in the observations he made on this plant, 
stated that, " on looking at the flowering plant, he was 
struck with a remarkable analogy between the arrangement 
and colouring parts of the leaf and of the flower, the 
petals of the flower being nearly of the same colour as the 
flap of the pitcher, and between each pair of petals is a 
hole formed by a notch on the side of the two opposite petals, 
leading to the stamens and pistil." This we also observed 
in the flower of a plant which blossomed in the Glasnevin 
gardens last May. The hypothesis that the coloured parts 
of flowers are designed for attracting insects to assist in 
fertilisation, while feeding themselves on the pollen and 
nectar, is well exemplified in this instance. The petals 
remain fixed round the stigma, while in the meantime, dur- 
ing three or four days, the anthers burst within, and are 
liable to lose their effect unless assisted by insects. " It 
is here conceivable," Dr. Hooker observes, " that this mar- 
vellous plant lures insects to its flowers for one object, and 
feeds them while it uses them to fertilise itself; but when 
that is accomplished, some of its benefactors are lured to 
its pitchers for feeding it." If such be the case, surely no 
man with ordinary reasoning powers, whatever his belief 
may be, can deny design of the highest order in this instance. 

We have still another group of beautiful and highly inter- 
esting plants, whose leaves are marvellously morphologised 
for capturing insects and holding water— the Nepenthes. 
Some of the pitchers belonging to species in this group are 
among the most beautiful and curiously formed organs in the 
whole vegetable kingdom, though considered by botanists 
less complicated than those of Sarraceiiice, Difference of 
opinion still exists among those who are best informed on 
the subject, regarding the parts of the leaf thus changed 
into the pitcher form, which we cannot further allude to 
here. We shall only remark respecting them, that although 
great variety of form may be observed in the pitchers of 
the different species, it is always the same parts of the leaf 



22 



THE STRUCTURE, ETC., OF PLANTS. 



that are changed. These pitchers are tubular, with a lid at 
their apex, which more or less covers the mouth of most 
kinds ; but in some, the mouth is quite open, and the lid, in 
place of bending over the mouth, bends backward. The 
pitcher is furnished with a thickened corrugated rim, which. 
Dr. Hooker observes, serves three purposes : it strengthens 




Nefeiithes distillatoria. 

the mouth and keeps it distended ; it secretes honey for 
attracting insects into the funnel-shaped tube in which it 
terminates ; and is, in some kinds, beset with a row of 
incurved hooks, that are occasionally strong enough to pre- 
vent even a small bird from escaping, if it has the temerity 
to enter these large pitchers in search of water or insects. 
The under side of the lid and rim of the pitchers is pro- 
vided with honey-secreting glands in great abundance. 
These parts are more highly coloured than the other parts 
of the pitchers, which it is reasonable to suppose is a design 
for attracting insects to them. The interior of the pitchers, 
though not beset with stiff retrorse bristles like the interior 
of the tubes of Sarracenice, nevertheless proves as fatal a trap 
to the unwary insect which is lured into them as that 
of the latter. The interior of the pitcher affords no foot- 
hold for insects, which drop to the bottom and are drowned 



THE MORPHOLOGY OF LEAVES. 23 

in the fluid, or become stupefied, so as to be unable to 
escape. One of the curious phases of these pitchers is, that 
fluid is secreted in them before the Hd opens, and when it 
is as closely sealed over as it is possible to be. In this 
state the pitchers can be turned upside-down, without a 
drop of the fluid escaping.* To test the digestive powers 
of Nepenthes, Mr. Darwin and Dr. Hooker put white of 
^%g, raw meat, fibrine, and cartilage in the pitchers, which, 
they state, had a surprising and evident action on them. 
After twenty-four hours' immersion, the edges of the cubes 
of white of tg^ are eaten away, and the surface gelatinised. 
Fragments of meat are rapidly reduced, and pieces of 
fibrine weighing several grains dissolve and disappear in 
two or three days. I have often been amazed at the large 
quantities of dead bodies of insects, in a half-decomposed 
state, some of those pitchers occasionally contain. In one 
instance I emptied a pitcher, and counted in it the remains 
of ninety-one ants, sixteen wasps, four large blue flies, one 
cockroach, five earwigs, and seven wood-lice, besides a 
putrid mass of the dead bodies of these creatures which 
could not be distinctly recognised. 

The Nepenthes are all natives of the warmer parts of the 
Old World, and chiefly inhabit the islands in the Indian 
archipelago, though some extend to New Holland. One 
of the New Holland pitcher-leaved plants, Cephalotiis folli- 
cularis, afl*ords another instance of those singularly-formed 
organs for holding water. It is smaller than any of the 
NepentJies ; but for beauty of form and elegance of construc- 
tion, it is not surpassed by any of the other pitcher-leaved 
plants. Its pitchers are hollow, and have their covering-lids 
exactly similar to some of those of the Nepenthes, though 

* Dr. Voeleker's experiments prove that the water is a true secretion 
of the plant, and not obtained from without. When he dipped litmus 
paper in the water taken from an unopened pitcher, the paper turned 
red, thus proving the presence of an acid or an acid salt. When 
heated, it gave out a slight smell of boiled apples, and on being 
analysed, it was found to contain small quantities of malic and citric 
acids. — Vocleker " On the Chemical Composition of the Fluid of the 
Acidia of Nepenthes^' Trans, of Bot. Soc\ of EtUnburgh, Vol. in., j). 233. 



24 THE STRUCTURE, ETC., OF PLANTS. 

they are not otherwise botanically related to them. This 
plant is only found in one quarter of the globe, near King 
George's Sound, Western Australia. I might add many 
more examples which evidently show design in the form 
of their leaves ; but having already dwelt on this topic at 
too great a length, I shall now speak of the flower itself. 



IV.— DESIGN AND ADAPTATION IN THE MORPHOLOGY 

OF THE FLOWERS. 

The flower, in all its beauty and captivating loveliness, con- 
sists only of leaves, changed or morphologised so as to effect 
most important purposes in the economy of the plant — 
namely, the production of seed and the continuation of its 
kind on the face of the earth. In stating a fact which is now 
an axiom in vegetable physiology, I do not mean that the 
parts which form the flower were ever real leaves and became 
changed, but they are the true analogues of leaves, and 
frequently change back to leaf-like organs. " This doctrine, 
which was dimly apprehended by the great Linnseus, 
was initiated by a German botanist, Caspar Frederic Wolf; 
and again independently, in successive generations, by the 
poet Goethe and by the elder De Candolle ; but it was not, 
until lately, well understood. The botanists of Goethe's day 
could not see any sense or practical application to be made 
of the proposition that the parts of a blossom answer to 
leaves ; and so the study of homologies had long to wait." 
— Garden. Even now it is somewhat repulsive to our 
senses to be told, when we eat an apple, pear, or orange, that 
we are eating altered leaves ; yet such is true. Every step we 
take in considering this matter shows infinite wisdom and 
design. After the proper organs of nutrition of the plant 
have been perfected, it puts on a different aspect, and begins 
to prepare for reproduction. The large leaves become 
smaller, and somew^iat altered in appearance ; the part on 
which the flowers are produced, shows itself, and elongates ; 
the individual flower-buds follow ; these, in the greater 
number of plants, are placed in the axil of a bract or small 



MORPHOLOGY OF THE FLOWERS. 



25 




a Calyx, 
b Corolla. 



c Stamens. 
d Pistils. 



altered leaf, which covers and protects them when young. 
As they advance and begin to swell out, a further protecting 
covering is observable in the outer whorl of changed leaves — 
the calyx, which in turn pro- 
tects the more tender parts -*-^ .^^T-^- 
while they are immature ; 
next, the second whorl of pro- 
tecting covering — the corolla, 
which is generally considered 
by those unacquainted with 
botanical science to be the 
flower /^7^ excellence ; but it is 
only a portion of it, and has 
its duties to fulfil in the economy of reproduction. We have 
already noticed that the highly-coloured parts of leaves of 
plants, and also the blossoms, are supposed to be principally 
designed for attracting insects to them. Now these crea- 
tures are very sensitive to perfumes, which in most instances 
lead them to their prey ; and it is from the corolla and 
nectariferous glands, situated on it, or near it, that the 
perfumes of flowers are 
chiefly emitted. We here 
see that the corolla has 
two offices assigned to 
it — the protecting of the 
more essential orcjans of 
reproduction, the sta- 
mens and pistils, while 
they are in a young state, 
and the displaying gay 
colours for attracting in- 
sects ; as well, no doubt, 
as to please and gratify 
mankind, and to adorn 
and beautify the external 
world — thus leading us 
to look with thankful- 
ness and adoration to 





Pistil. 


Stamens. 


a Ovarium. 


d Filament. 


h Stylo. 


t Antlier. . 


c Stigma. 


/ Pollen. 



26 THE STRUCTURE, ETC., OF PLANTS. 

the great God of the Universe through His manifold 
works. These two important coverings, calyx and corolla, 
are not, however, essential to all plants for reproduction, 
as there are a considerable number which bear seeds 
abundantly with the aid of only one of them, the calyx — 
some without this aid altogether. The parts which are 
truly essential are the two inner rows of altered leaves, the 
stamens and pistils ; and the manner which they operate 
for the production of seeds is often very wonderful, and 
surely beyond the realm of chance. 



v.— DESIGN AND ADAPTATION IN THE FERTILISATION 

OF PLANTS. 

At the late meeting of the British Association in Belfast, 
I doubt not that many of you will remember the interest- 
ing lecture given by Sir John Lubbock on " Common wild 
flowers considered in relation to insects," when he showed 
the many beautiful and mechanical contrivances which they 
possess for their fertilisation. This curious subject has been 
well attended to by our painstaking and thoughtful friends 
the Germans. In a book published last year at Leipzig, by 
Dr. Herman MuUer, under the title of " Die Refruchtung 
der Blumen durch Lisecten," it is well and cleverly handled. 
Numerous and excellent woodcuts of the parts of the flowers 
noticed are given, and their construction explained ; also 
the parts of insects are figured, which together show the 
immense field of observation the author has travelled over. 

We shall only be able to make a few brief observations on 
this extensive subject, in order to show design in the forma- 
tion of the stamens and pistils for fertilisation. This matter, 
like that which we have been discussing on insect-catching 
plants, was known and written on with considerable ability 
at the end of the last century ; but in a similar manner was 
allowed to remain in oblivion, until disentombed by Mr. 
Darwin. Sprengel, in an early work on the subject, had 
observed how necessary it was that insects should visit plants. 



THE FERTILISATION OF PLANTS. 27 

in order to transfer the pollen of the stamens of one flower 
to that of another ; but he did not fully comprehend its 
great importance. It frequently happens that the pistils in 
flowers ripen before the stamens, and become incapable of 
fertilisation when the pollen is ripe ; but insects visiting the 
plant, and feeding from one flower to another, carry the 
pollen on their head or shoulders to other flowers, by which 
means they are fertilised. This we noticed during the 
present summer in one of the conservatories of Glasnevin, 
in a very beautiful plant belonging to the family of Gen- 
tians — Lisianthits Russelianus, which has protandrous 
stamens. The pollen grew in large masses on the anthers, 
and was visited by flies and humble bees, which constantly 
became more or less besmeared with it when feeding, and 
carried it to the pistils prepared to receive it, after their 
own stamens had become eff"ete. By the aid of insects, 
nearly every flower became fertilised, and produced seeds. 

With regard to the corolla, the supposition is that 
one of its uses is to attract insects to the flower. As 
an exemplification of this, I may mention the singular 
fact that those plants which flower at night, and remain 
open only one night, have principally white flowers, which 
we may conjecture is designed for attracting night 
moths and other night-feeding insects to them. The 
splendid night-blooming Cactus, Cereus grafidifloriis, afl'ords 
a good example. The flowers of this plant begin to ex- 
pand about eight o'clock in the evening, and by ten o'clock 
are fully opened. They are of a creamy white colour, with 
hundreds of stamens in each flower, and the delicious per- 
fume emitted fills the whole conservatory in which they 
are cultivated with a spicy kind of odour. By the first 
dawn of morning, they are partially or nearly closed, and 
they never open again. If they are fertilised artificially, 
or perchance by insects, they close up quickly ; but if not 
fertilised, they remain partially open during a portion of 
the following morning. This species was, for many years, 
supposed to be the only night-flowering kind of Cactus ; 
but amongst the numerous plants introduced into our 



28 



THE STRUCTURE, ETC., OF PLANTS. 



gardens and conservatories within the last quarter of a 
century, there has been a fair proportion of the Cactus 
tribe, including a number of night -flowering kinds, 
the flowers of which 
are all white. I do 
not know a single in- 
stance of a purple, 
red, or yellow Cactus 
which is night-flower- 



ing, 



though 




m no 
other genus of plants 
are those brilliant 
colours more con- 
spicuous than in the 
day-floweringspecies 
of it. The perfume 
in most of the night- 
flowering kinds is 
alsostrongand agree- 
able. In these in- 
stances we have, no 
doubt, design dis- 
played, both in the 
colouring of the 
flowers and per- 
fume emitted from 
them, for the attrac- 
tion of insects. 
Again, we have a 
number of flowers 
which smell sweetly 
and powerfully by 
night, but have little or no perfume during the day ; and 
these for the most part have dull, greyish-coloured flowers. 
This occurs among a considerable number of orchids, 
but a more famihar example may be found in the old- 
fashioned " night-smelling Stock," CheirantJms tristis, with 
which many of us have long been familiar, though it 



a Ovarium. 



& Pistils. 



c Stamens. 



THE FERTILISATION OF PLANTS. 29 

is not now so frequently met with in gardens as it 
formerly was. I may mention another plant, at one 
time rather a favourite in our conservatories, which 
only opens its flowers and emits its perfume at night — 
namely, the Nycterinia lychnidea : its habit is denoted 
by its generic name. During the day the sepals and 
petals incurve so as nearly to meet and close up the flower; 
but at sundown they expand widely, and show the pretty 
white blossoms, which are very agreeably perfumed. 

There are many instances that might be adduced, showing 
design for fertilisation among plants which have the stamens 
in one individual and the pistils in another, and which are 
called by botanists dioecious or diclinous. I shall mention one 
very remarkable case — viz., Valisneria spiralis, a plant which 
grows in fresh-water rivers, and is not uncommon in many 
parts of Southern Europe. The flowers in the male or 
staminiferous plant are extremely minute, white, and of a 
globular form, and are sessile on a conical-formed rachis, 
the whole being enclosed, while young, in a spathe or sheath, 
which latter splits open into two or three pieces when 
mature, thus allowing the little flowers to detach them- 
selves from the rachis on which they were seated, and rise 
by their natural buoyancy to the surface of the water, where 
the three-parted calyx expands, and permits the pollen to 
escape from the anthers of the stamens. The female or 
pistiliferous flowers are quite different from those of the 
staminiferous. Each of the former is enclosed in a tubular 
spathe, attached simply to the end of a very long, slender, 
spirally-twisted stalk, which uncoils more or less according 
to the depth of the water, so as to allow the flower to float 
on the surface, where it expands and is fertilised by the float- 
ing pollen of the numerous male flowers coming in contact 
with its stigmas. 

We have yet to notice design in the structure of flowers, 
connected with their fertilisation by the aid of insects. The 
large family of the orchidaceous plants has been made a 
special study by Mr. Darwin, who considers that none of 
the flowers in this numerous section is fertilised by its 



o 



THE STRUCTURE, ETC., OF PLANTS. 



own stamens, but rather by the pollen of other flowers, 
aided by insects. The arguments and reasons he brings 
forward to support his views are certainly ingenious and 
original. No doubt his theory is correct in the main, but 
we have seen the flowers of orchids produce seed in our 
conservatories during the winter months, when flying 
insects were not visible. The peculiar structure and 
forms of the flowers of this remarkable genus, along with 
the beautiful colours which adorn them, give them an in- 
terest which is not attached to any other family of plants 
at the present time. Many of them are fac-similes of bees, 
flies, spiders, moths, locusts, and even small birds. In many 
of them their flowers are so grotesque in form, that it is 
no longer with the vegetable kingdom they can be com- 
pared, but their resemblance must be sought in the animal 
world. For the most part they do not grow in the earth 
like other plants, but attach themselves to the bark of 
trees, taking their support from the bodies they adhere to, 
yet they are not nourished by them ; hence they are called 
epiphytes, not parasites. In the flowers of all this tribe the 
stamens are seated on the pistillum, and their pollen — or 
pollinia, as it is called — is different in consistence from that 
of nearly all other flowers, being viscid, soft, and col- 
lected together in little masses attached to short stalks or 
caudicles. These pollinia are enclosed in a slender envelope, 
or cap, which ruptures transversely on being touched, thus 
exposing the viscid masses. When the enveloping cap, 
which often resembles the head of an insect or bird, is re- 
moved, the pollinia are often irritable and spring forward, 
attaching themselves by their viscid surface to the body 
which causes the irritation to take place. The nectar-gland 
is within the flower, and cannot be reached by an insect 
until it pushes its head inward, and thrusts forth its proboscis 
towards the gland. By this action, the head of the creature 
and its proboscis come in contact with the pollen masses, 
which adhere to them, owing to their viscid nature, and 
are carried to the next flower the insect visits ; being thus 
brought in contact with its pistillum, the latter is fertilised 



I 



THE FERTILISATION OF PLANTS. C 31 



by the pollen of a different flower. I have frequently seen 
bees flying about from flower to flower with a number 
of those pollen bodies attached to their head, shoulders, 
and proboscis. In none of the kinds is this wonderful 
design and contrivance more conspicuous than in the 
"lady-slipper" plants, the genus Cypripediinn, the species of 
which have the pollen masses rather differently fixed from 
those of most of the other kinds of OrchidacecB. They are in 
two separate sets, so that in the Linnaean system this genus 
was placed in a different order of the class Gyiiandria — • 
namely, the second order Diandria ; the others being in the 
first order, Monandria. In some of the species of this genus 
the top of the rostellum, which in many of the other kinds 
forms an appearance like a little head, is here flattened out and 
coloured, so that insects may readily alight on it ; near the 
base of it are two apertures, one on each side, in which the 
pollen masses are placed in such a manner as to render it 
nearly impossible for an insect to enter without carrying 
them away on its head or shoulders ; and there is no other 
way it can reach the honey, except through one or other of 
those two apertures. The honey-gland in some species is 
surrounded with viscid hairs which entangle small insects that 
enter, and hold them fast until they perish. I have counted 
from twelve to fifteen of their dead bodies lying among the 
hairs of one flower of C. ScJilimii. In the irritability of the 
stamens, design might be shown in many cases, a few of 
which may suffice for our present purpose. In one genus 
of plants — namely, Stylidiiini — the column of fructification 
is curiously placed. The stigma is at the apex of a long 
ovary-like body, which is articulate or jointed at its base ; 
the two anthers are sessile, close to the stigma, and placed 
one on each side of it. This long ovary body is reflexed, 
and hangs almost directly head-downwards ; but the in- 
stant it is touched by any insect, or designedly, it throws 
a somersault by the aid of the articulation at its base, and 
in so doing, hits against the body which caused it to jerk 
forward, and thus scatters the pollen and fertilises the stigma. 
Our common barberry affords another instance of this 



"^0 



6-1 THE STRUCTURE, ETC., OF PLANTS. 

phenomenon. The stamens in the barberry flowers lie 
back in the cavities of the petals of the corolla, away from 
the pistillum, so that the pollen would be lost if discharged 
while they are in that state ; but their irritable filaments, 
on being touched on their inner faces by insects in search 
of honey, move forward one after the other in regular suc- 
cession, and discharge their pollen on the pistillum, or on 
any insect that may be near at the time, thus giving the 
flowers a double chance of being fertilised naturally and 
by the aid of insects. The stamens in the North American 
Kabnias act similarly, and are highly irritable. I might 
farther show design in the formation of flowers, as well as 
in the behaviour of plants after fertilisation had been eflected 
and the seeds ripening ; but having already observed 
on all the parts of the plant seriatim, I shall only re- 
mark, in conclusion, how unerringly the pollen tubes pene- 
trate the stigma, and, overcoming all obstacles, direct their 
course to the small opening in the ovule, through which 
alone they can enter to effect the fertilisation of the embr^'o 
cells. In this one might be led to suppose it nearly an act 
of consciousness. We thus see in the important pheno- 
mena of reproduction, not only unmistakable instances of 
design manifested, but indications of vitality, especially 
when the reproduction of some of the lower tribes of cellular 
plants is taken into consideration. In all nature, the sim- 
plicity of her works is not less remarkable than their 
perfection, and their acting harmoniously to accomplish 
whatever end they are destined for in the boundless con- 
ceptions of the Creator. We shall therefore conclude by 
again quoting from the sweet Psalmist of Israel, " O Lord, 
how manifold are Thy works ! in wisdom hast Thou made 
them all : the earth is full of Thv riches." 






cA~a-3 , 



gin teminatiirn ^f J^ijlr^rt ^^n.tt\% 

^ — / 

REV. PROFESSOR WATTS. 



SPENCER'S BIOLOGICAL HYPOTHESIS. 



♦ '•■♦ 



AS stated by himself, Mr. Spencer's aim in his elaborate 
treatise on biology, "is to set forth the general truths of 
biology, as illustrative of, and as interpreted by, the laws of 
evolution : the special truths being introduced only so far as 
is needful for elucidation of the general truths." For aid in 
the execution of this task, Mr. Spencer acknowledges his 
indebtedness to Professor Huxley and Dr. Hooker, who 
not only supplied him with information where his own was 
deficient, but also looked through the proof-sheets, pointing 
out errors of detail into which he had fallen ; or, as he 
expresses it in the preface to his second volume, furnished 
him with valuable criticisms, and took the trouble of check- 
ing the numerous statements of fact on which the argu- 
ments proceed. • 

The candour of Mr. Spencer in this acknowledgment of 
his dependence upon others for information, and of his 
indebtedness for correction and criticism, is only equalled 
by his polemic chivalry in his review of Professor Owen's 
theory of the vertebrate skeleton. He prefaces his strictures 
by the following confession : — " We confess that nearly all 
we know of this department of biology" (the bony structure 
of the vertebrata), " has been learnt from his lectures and 
writings. We pretend to no independent investigations, but 
merely to such knowledge of the phenomena as he has 
furnished us with. Our position, then, is such that, had 
Professor Owen simply enunciated his generalisations, we 
should have accepted them on his authority. But he has 
brought forward evidence to prove them. By so doing, he has 
tacitly appealed to the judgment of his readers and hearers 
— has practically said, * Here are the facts ; do they not 
warrant these conclusions .-** And all we propose to do, is 



4 SPENCER S BIOLOGICAL HYPOTHESIS. 

to consider whether the conclusions are warranted by the 
facts brought forward." 

The position here assumed is not only just, but generous. 
It is just, in that the reviewer judges of Professor Owen's 
conclusions from the facts adduced in their support ; it is 
generous, in that he holds himself in readiness to accept 
Professor Owen's generalisations on his own authority, 
without any proof whatever. It is, of course, to be pre- 
sumed that this profession of generosity is to be accepted 
with all the abatements demanded by the interests of 
science. Science cannot afford to be generous, and it is 
peculiarly unscientific, as it is unphilosophical and unwise, to 
accept generalisations on the mere authority of any man. 

The chief object of these references to Mr. Spencer's 
relation to the facts with which he deals in his work on 
biology, is to vindicate the class to which he belongs from 
the charge of presumption, in undertaking to judge of the 
warrantableness of the conclusions which scientists have 
deduced from the phenomena of nature. Mr. Spencer con- 
fesses that he is not a scientist in the ordinary acceptation 
of the term. He is not a chemist ; he is not an astronomer ; 
he is not a physiologist ; he is not a molecular or atomic 
physicist ; he does not profess to be a geologist or a botanist ; 
but he, nevertheless, claims the right of judging of the con- 
clusions arrived at by the foremost of the practical investi- 
gators in these departments of the wondrous phenomena of 
nature. If a man come forth out of any of these departments 
with his conclusions, and refer, in proof of their validity, to 
facts, Mr. Spencer will meet him with all the courtesy and 
grace of a knight-errant ; but he will give him to understand 
that he must face him in a logical tournament before he has 
earned his scientific spurs. He will trust him as a witness 
of what he has seen with the telescope or miscroscope, or 
of what has been revealed to him under the torture of the 
crucible, or the stroke of the hammer, or the all but atom- 
disclosing radiance of the electric beam ; but as soon as he 
passes from testimony to inference, he will apply to his 
conclusions tests furnished, not by the laws of matter, but 



THE TERM EVOLUTION EQUIVOCAL. 5 

by the laws of mind, to which, by the very fact of his 
attempt at inference, he has appealed. 

What Mr. Spencer has done in his review of Professor 
Owen, theologians claim the right to do in his own case. 
" All they propose to do is to consider whether his con- 
clusions are warranted by the facts brought forward " — 
facts, be it observed, which he, like themselves, has merely 
at second-hand. In estimating his work on biology, they 
raise no other questions than he himself has raised in his 
treatment of the works of others. They simply ask what 
are his conclusions, and what are the facts to which he 
appeals in support of them ? 

In general terms, his conclusions may be characterised 
by the one word evolution. The term biology means simply 
the science of life, and Mr. Spencer's hypothesis, on which 
he has built up this system of biology developed in these 
two volumes, is evolutionary. The term evolutionary is 
here employed advisedly, because of the equivocalness of the 
term evolution. As evolution simply signifies the process 
of evoking, or rolling out, something already existing, at 
least in its elements (which is more than Mr. Spencer 
admits), it has been employed by parties differing widely 
both in regard to the agencies and instruments by which 
the process of evolvement or evocation, has been effected, or 
conducted. A man who holds that the present order of 
things — embracing the orderly arrangements of the universe, 
and the fauna and flora of our earth — has been evoked or 
evolved from previously created, or previously existing, 
suitable material, by the skill and power of an infinitely 
wise and an infinitely powerful Architect, may, nevertheless, 
be called an evolutionist. Or a man may entertain the 
crude notions of a Democritus or a Lucretius, recently 
eulogised before the British Association, and regard the 
existing order as evolved from atoms equipped with hooks 
and claws, and be none the less entitled to rank as an 
evolutionist ; or he may differ from Lucretius as much as a 
modern worker in the domain of molecular physics differs 
from a man absolutely destitute of the rudest appliance oi^ 



6 SPE^XER'S BIOLOGICAL HYPOTHESIS. 

the laboratory, and yet belong to this wide-reaching 
category. Democritus and Lucretius, Dr. Erasmus Darwin 
and Lamarck, Mr. Charles Darwin and Professor Huxley, 
Dr. Tyndall and Mr. Herbert Spencer, theist and atheist, 
believers in a personal God, and those who, stripping God 
of the attribute of personality, would identify Him with 
nature, and deny that He possesses any independent ante- 
mundane or extramundane life — may all, so far as the signi- 
fication of the term is concerned, be designated evolutionists. 
In a word, the term is equivocal, and therefore misleading, 
until it is defined. It may be used to designate a general 
class, but only where the design is to express the very 
general notion, that those embraced under the class agree 
in holding that the present order of things is the outcome, 
whether by natural or supernatural agency, of previously 
existing states of matter. As soon as it is proposed to treat 
of an evolutionary hypothesis, it is demanded alike by per- 
spicuity and honesty, that it be differentiated from others 
bearing the same general class-name. 

Mr. Spencer's hypothesis differs from all the evolutionary 
hypotheses which, as far as I am aware, have hitherto been 
broached. He is not, it is scarcely necessary to say, a 
Lucretian, and he is not a Darwinian of the type of Dr. 
Erasmus Darwin, or Lamarck, or even of Mr. Charles 
Darwin. He rejects every theory which might militate in 
any way against the assumption that mind has nothing to 
do, either directly or indirectly, with the evolutionary 
process ; and therefore he will not admit that there exists 
in organisms even a primordial impulse impelling them to 
unfold into more heterogeneous forms. Had he been in the 
vicinity of Professor Tyndall on the occasion of his recent 
Manchester recantation, when he admitted that "every- 
where throughout our planet we notice this tendency of the 
ultimate particles of matter to run into symmetric forms," 
and affirmed that " the very molecules seem instinct with a 
desire for union and growth," he would have warned him 
that he was treading on the margin of very dangerous con- 
cessions, and would have informed him that, not "tendency 



spencer's hypothesis purely mechanical. 7 

to unfold," but "liability to be unfolded,"* is the present 
position of the advanced thinkers of the evolutionary 
school. Nor is he satisfied even with this safeguard 
against the intrusion of mind. He is careful to add, as a 
qualifying clause, that even this "liabiHty to be unfolded" 
arises from the actions and reactions of organisms and 
their fluctuating environments." His hypothesis may be 
termed the mechanical-genesis hypothesis. Adaptation 
becomes, in his hands, "direct equilibration;" and Mr. • 
Darwin's "natural selection" is translated into "indirect 
equilibration." But whilst he criticises, or rejects, or modifies, 
all previous scientific hypotheses, the chief design of his 
work is to overthrow the Scripture doctrine of special 
creations. Singling out this doctrine, which he entitles a 
hypothesis, he says — " Either the multitudinous kinds of 
organisms that now exist, and the still more multitudinous 
kinds that have existed during past geologic eras, have been 
from time to time separately made ; or they have arisen by 
insensible steps, through actions such as we see habitually 
going on. Both hypotheses," he adds, " imply a cause. The 
last, certainly as much as the first, recognises this cause 
as inscrutable. The point at issue," he alleges, " is how this 
inscrutable cause has worked in the production of living 
forms. This point, if it is to be decided at all, is to be 
decided only by the examination of evidence. Let us 
inquire which of these antagonistic hypotheses is most con- 
gruous with established facts." ■[* 

It will be seen from this statement that Mr. Spencer 
admits a cause, but holds this cause to be inscrutable. In 
this he claims agreement with what he is pleased to designate 
the creation hypothesis, which he rejects. Now this is not 
a fair account of the views of his opponents in regard to the 
ultimate cause. Creationists do not regard the ultimate 
cause as inscrutable. They do hold that the ultimate cause 
cannot be known to perfection ; but this is a very different 
thing from holding that they know nothing whatever about 
that cause. 
* " Principles of Biology," Vol. i., pp. 430-1. t Ibidy Vol. I., pp. 331-2. 



8 spencer's biological hypothesis. 

The point here raised is in fact the chief point at issue. 
Mr. Spencer alleges that the ultimate cause is inscrutable ; 
and here the issue is ioined. We do not admit the ricrht of 
any man to refer phenomena to a cause which is inscrutable ; 
for the very obvious reason, that before the reference is 
thought of, he must observe something in the phenomena 
warranting and suggesting the reference. No such reference 
is ever made by any intelligent being, except on the obser- 
vance of qualities or actions in the phenomena which can, 
in his estimation, be accounted for only on the assumption 
that a cause possessing certain attributes has produced 
them. This is, of course, all one with saying that before 
he makes the reference he has some conception of the cause 
to which he makes it. Mr. Spencer regards the unthink- 
ableness of the creation hypothesis a sufficient reason for 
rejecting it. This hypothesis, he remarks, "implies the 
establishment of a relation in thought between nothing 
and something — a relation of which one term is absent 
— an impossible relation."* Now if it be impossible to esta- 
blish a relation in thought between nothing and some- 
thing, or to establish a relation where one term of the 
relation is wanting, how are we to establish a relation 
between the phenomena of the universe and an alleged 
inscrutable cause .-* An inscrutable cause is an unknown 
cause, and with an unknown thing no relation can be 
imagined. The term of the relation represented by the 
unknown cause, is a term which cannot be present to 
thought, and must, therefore, be regarded as not furnishing 
the additional element of the relation, which, according to 
Mr. Spencer, is indispensable " to the framing of coherent 
thought." Judged, therefore, by his own crucial test of all 
truth, and his own postulated condition of all thinking, this 
position is indefensible. It is not only unphilosophical to 
ascribe phenomena to an inscrutable cause, but the ascrip- 
tion is absolutely unthinkable. Let any man make the 
experiment, and he will soon be convinced that the thing 
adventured is impossible even in imagination. Of an inscrut- 
■^ " Principles of Biology," Vol. I., p. 336. 



HIS ULTIMATE UNKNOWABLE, YET MANIFESTED! 9 

able thing, nothing can be affirmed save that it is inscrut- 
able, and to it nothing implying knowledge of it can be 
ascribed or referred ; and of all the imaginable predicates, 
the predicate proposed by the evolutionists is at the farthest 
remove from admissibility. The predicate embraces the 
entire phenomena of the entire universe, including the 
evolutionist himself; whilst the something of which all 
these are predicated is, in his own view of it (if view of the 
inscrutable be possible), absolutely unknowable and un- 
known ! 

It is well that the laws of thought will not permit even 
the ablest philosopher to conduct with impunity a process 
of thinking involving an absolute absurdity. Of the truth 
of this maxim, Mr. Spencer's writings furnish abundant 
illustrations ; and of these, one of the most notable is his 
account of the manifestation of this same inscrutable cause. 
In his "First Principles,"* he informs us that "matter and 
motion, as we know them, are differently conditioned 
manifestations of force;" and, in the very same breath, he 
affirms that this same force, of which matter and motion 
are the manifestations, "must for ever remain unknown"! 
It would seem impossible to write down two sentences more 
palpably at variance than these. First, we are told that 
force manifests itself under the conditions furnished by 
matter and motion ; and then we are told that these 
"differently conditioned manifestations" of it give us no 
information whatever of what force is ! That is, force 
manifests itself, and yet does not make itself manifest ! 
When a man can believe that a thing can be, and at the 
same time not be, he may be able to believe that a thing 
can manifest itself, and yet impart no information respecting 
itself. 

On the relation of matter to force, Mr. Spencer is 
exceedingly unphilosophical. He regards matter as simply 
a condition of the manifestation of force. This is exactly 
the reverse of the actual relation, and involves the subordi- 
nation of a substance to its own qualities. Matter sustains 

* "First Principles," p. 169. 



10 



spencer's biological hypothesis. 



to force no such relationship. Of the force referred to, 
matter is the source ; and were there no matter in existence, 
there would not only be no manifestation of this force, but 
there would be no such force to be manifested. The force 
in question is not an entity existing outside and independent 
of matter, availing itself of matter as a medium of manifesta- 
tion ; it is itself the offspring of the qualities of matter, and 
through it matter reveals itself The fact is, Mr. Spencer's 
notion of the relation in question would reduce matter to 
the rank of an occasional cause, and, stripping it of all 
claim to causal efficiency, would make the elements of which 
it consists a source of perpetual delusion. It is not only 
the common conviction of mankind, but it is the conviction 
of those who have investigated most thoroughly the 
domain of molecular physics, that matter is the possessor, 
and not the mere revealer of force. 

It is unnecessary formally to establish this position. The 
physical sciences are founded upon it. The astronomer, 
and the molecular physicist, alike proceed upon the assump- 
tion that the forces with which they are dealing, are not 
extra-material entities, but qualities or attributes inherent 
in matter itself This fact is fatal to the claims put forth 
in behalf of Mr. Spencer's "ultimate of ultimates," as it 
reduces it to the category of a mere quality of matter. 
A mere quality can never take the rank of an ultimate 
cause. An ultimate cause, and especially the ultimate of 
ultimates, must exist prior to, and independent of, all things 
except itself, and must account for their existence. This a 
mere quality cannot do. As it implies, from its very 
nature, the existence of a substance in which it inheres, and 
without which it can have no being, it is manifest that it 
cannot be regarded as antecedent to that substance, or 
independent of it. As all this is true of force in its relations 
to matter, it follows, of necessity, that force cannot be 
regarded as the ultimate cause from which this stupendous 
universe, with its fauna and flora, has come forth. 

But even though it were conceded that there is outside 
and independent of matter, a distinct entity called force, 



HIS ULTIMATE REDUCED TO "PUSH" AND "PULL." 11 

it is difficult to see how this concession would aid the 
cause of the Spencerian evolutionist ; for either this 
entity is possessed of intelligence, or it is not. If it be 
intelligent, and display that intelligence in the determi- 
nation of ends to be wrought out, and the adaptation 
of means for working out the ends determined, it must be 
possessed of all the essendal attributes of personality — 
must be capable of purpose and contrivance — must, in fact, 
possess reason and will, as well as power. In a word, it 
must be the very entity for whose existence theologians 
contend — it must be God. If, however, it do not possess 
intelligence and will, it is, ipso facto, disqualified for the 
exercise of the imperial prerogatives assigned to it by the 
evolutionists. Stripped of all ambiguity, what is this entity } 
As described by men of science, its functions are expressed 
by the two terms, attraction and repulsion, or, to use the 
popular language of Dr. Tyndall, by the terms "push" and 
"pull." Will any man, who has any regard for his reputa- 
tion, venture to say that all the phenomena of the universe 
are the offspring of "push" and "pull".-* Does anyone 
imagine that any amount of pushing and pulling would 
ever originate matter } Does any evolutionist believe that, 
by pushing and pulling, matter absolutely neutral, if there 
could be such a substance, could be invested with diverse 
attributes ; or that one kind of matter could be differentiated 
into the distinct elements which actually exist .-* Or, to go 
farther back, can any intelligent being believe that, prior to 
the existence of any substance, whether material or spiritual, 
there could be any such actions as are expressed by "push" 
and "pull".'* He who speaks of "push" and "pull" as 
ultimate, simply uses language without import. The idea 
attempted defies thought. Let Mr. Spencer test it by his 
own crucial test of all truth — let him try a mental presen- 
tation of " push" and " pull" where there is nothing to push 
or pull, and nothing to be pushed or pulled, and he will 
find that the elements necessary to coherent thought arc 
wanting. 

Common sense repudiates the Spencerian ultimate as 



12 spencer's biological hypothesis. 

absolutely unthinkable. If, as all admit, out of nothing 
nothing comes, there can be no "push" or "pull" apart 
from an antecedent pusher or puller. Nor is this all ; for 
this same principle of causality demands the existence of 
suitable materials to be pushed and pulled. To take an 
example from magnetic pushing and puUing ; "push" and 
"pull," intelligently regulated, will account for the syste- 
matic grouping of iron filings around the poles of a magnet ; 
but if one substitute for the magnet, a piece of lead, or for 
the iron filings, a number of marbles, he will find that there 
will be neither pushing nor pulling, and that the systematic 
grouping which elicited his admiration in the former case 
is altogether wanting in the latter. And as it is with 
proximate, so it is with more remote effects. The "push" 
and "pull" incident to gravitation will account for the 
movement of our earth around the sun, and for the modifi- 
cations of its orbit, which extend over cycles embracing, 
perhaps, more than a million of years ; but let there be a 
globe of iron, or even of carbon, or of any other single 
element of matter, hung in the place of our wondrously con- 
stituted orb, and "push" and "pull" may put forth upon it 
all their might through all the aeons of the coming eternity, 
without originating a single form of animal or vegetable 
life, much less an organism possessing conscious intellect 
and will. 

In a word, the evolution hypothesis advocated by Mr. 
Spencer breaks down at the very outset. It is only by 
veiling itself in a haze of so-called first principles, which 
seem plausible in the abstract, that it can for a moment 
impose upon any intelligent being. Its ultimate cause, 
which it dignifies with the superb title of " the ultimate 
of ultimates," on which it hangs the mighty burden 
of the entire universe, is absolutely unthinkable, except 
as a quality or attribute of those substances for whose 
existence and phenomena it undertakes to account. In 
other words, the only conditions under which force is 
thinkable as having existence at all, are such as to render 
it simply preposterous to assign to it the position of 



A QUALITY CANNOT BE ULTIMATE. 13 

the ultimate cause. If there can be no force apart from a 
substance, material or immaterial ; and if the qualities or 
attributes of a substance cannot be the cause of the sub- 
stance in which they inhere, it must follow that force, which 
is itself but a quality, cannot be the ultimate cause of all 
substances and of all phenomena. However limited our 
knowledge of the ultimate cause may be, we know of a 
certainty that it cannot be the mere quality of something 
else. That which is subordinate and dependent cannot be 
ultimate. 

Wrong in his conception of the ultimate cause, Mr. 
Spencer is also in error as to the ultimate question at issue 
respecting its operation. The question is not, as stated by 
him, " how has it worked ?" but the far easier one, " has it 
worked with design .'*" These are very different questions, 
presenting widely different problems. It is one thing to en- 
quire /2^2X/ the operations of nature are carried on, and another 
to enquire whether they are so carried on as to indicate a 
design. So diverse are these enquiries, that the one may 
be successfully prosecuted where the other transcends finite 
capacity. A passage which I take the liberty of quoting 
from a sermon by Professor Huxley, on " The Origin of 
Species," will enable us to judge of the warrantableness of 
the distinction referred to, and of the comparative feasibility 
of the two lines of investigation. " The student of nature," 
says this eminent physiologist, " wonders the more, and is 
astonished the less, the more conversant he becomes with 
her operations ; but of all the perennial miracles she offers 
to his inspection, perhaps the most worthy of admiration is 
the development of a plant or of an animal from its embryo. 
Examine the recently-laid egg of some common animal, 
such as a salamander or a newt. It is a minute spheroid, 
in which the best microscope will reveal nothing but a 
structureless sac, enclosing a glairy fluid, holding granules 
in suspension. But strange possibilities lie dormant in that 
semi-fluid globule. Let a moderate supply of warmth reach 
its watery cradle, and the plastic matter undergoes changes 
so rapid, and yet so steady and purpose-like in their sue- 



14 spencer's biological hypothesis. 

cession, that one can only compare them to those operated 
by a skilled modeller upon a formless lump of clay. As 
with an invisible trowel, the mass is divided and sub-divided 
into smaller and smaller portions, until it is reduced to an 
aggregation of granules not too large to build withal the 
finest fabrics of the nascent organism. And then, it is as if 
a delicate finger traced out the line to be occupied by the 
spinal column, and moulded the contour of the body ; 
pinching up the head at the one end and the tail at the 
other, and fashioning flank and limb into due salamandrine 
proportions in so artistic a way, that, after watching the 
process hour by hour, one is almost involuntarily possessed 
by the notion that some more subtle aid to vision than an 
achromatic would show the hidden artist, with his plan 
before him, striving with skilful manipulation to perfect his 
work." * 

Now if we are to trust the testimony of Professor Huxley, 
who has watched with an achromatic the very process 
about which the enquiry is raised, our verdict must be given 
against Mr. Spencer's statement of the question at issue in 
this controversy. According to Professor Huxley, the 
question raised by Mr. Spencer cannot be answered. The 
how of the operation by which that semi-fluid globule is 
transformed into the resultant organism, is the very point 
on which physiological research has thus far shed no light. 
But whilst science cannot answer Mr. Spencer's question, 
it can answer the one raised by creationists. While it 
cannot detect the artist in the act of moulding the plastic 
material into the nascent organism, it declares that the 
■changes which take place are "so steady and purpose-like 
in their succession," that " one is involuntarily possessed by 
the notion" that if he had keener vision he would see the 
artist at work. In a word, the facts of embryology, as 
testified to by Professor Huxley, on whose testimony Mr. 
Spencer acknowledges he has to depend, reveal a process of 
modelling in harmony with a plan. The Iww of the process 
is not revealed — the trowel, and the hand that wields it so 
* " Lay Sermons," &c., pp. 260, 261. 



THE ULTIMATE CAUSE WORKS WITH DESIGN. 15 

dexterously, elude all scrutiny — but voluntarily, or involun- 
tarily, the observer becomes possessed of the notion or the 
conviction that the mystic process is carried forward under 
the guidance of a designing mind. 

Whether, then, we enquire into Mr. Spencer's doctrine of 
the unknowableness of the ultimate cause, or into his posi- 
tion in regard to the question respecting its operation, we 
find his views to be indefensible. In the one case he is at 
war with philosophy, and in the other, with the inevitable 
convictions generated by a careful observation of the chief 
phenomena in question. Science proves that, behind 
matter and its qualities, there is a cause which works with 
design. 

Reserving for a future lecture the specific arguments by 
which Mr. Spencer endeavours to sustain his hypothesis, it 
is proposed, at present, simply to examine his reasons for 
rejecting the doctrine of special creation. 

His first reason is that there is a presumption against it 
because of its association with primitive beliefs. " The pri- 
mitive beliefs of the race respecting the structure of the 
heavens were wrong ; and the notions which replaced them 
were successively less wrong. The original belief respect- 
ing the form of the earth was wrong ; and this wrong belief 
survived the first civilisations. The earliest ideas that have 
come down to us concerning the natures of the elements were 
wrong ; and only in quite recent times has the composition 
of matter in its various forms been better understood. The 
interpretations of mechanical facts, of meteorological facts, 
of physiological facts, were at first wrong. In all these 
cases men set out with beliefs which, if not absolutely false, 
contained but small amounts of truth disguised by immense 
amounts of error. Hence," Mr. Spencer concludes, " the 
hypothesis that living beings resulted from special creations, 
being a primitive hypothesis, is probably an untrue hypo- 
thesis. If the interpretations of nature given by aboriginal 
men were erroneous in other directions, they were most 
likely erroneous in this direction. It would be strange if, 
while these aboriginal men failed to roach the truth in so 



IG spencer's biological hypothesis. 

many cases where it is comparatively conspicuous, they yet 
reached it where it is comparatively hidden." 

Mr. Spencer tries to strengthen this argitmenti^n ad 
hividiam by classing this primitive belief with the 
abandoned conceptions of fetichism and polytheism, and the 
various anthropomorphic conceptions of the unknown cause, 
which he alleges are " everywhere fading away." If all the 
other parts of the story put into our minds in childhood 
have long since been rejected, this remaining part of it, he 
expects, will ere long be relinquished also.* 

On this argument, or rather attempt to create prejudice 
against the doctrine attacked, it may be remarked — 

I. The principle on which this objection to the doctrine 
of creation is founded, is strangely out of harmony with 
the position assumed by Mr. Spencer, in his " First Princi- 
ples," in regard to ancient and widely-prevalent beliefs. In 
his " Principles of Biology," he assumes that the proba- 
bility is against the truth of a primitive hypothesis, whilst 
in his " First Principles" he takes the ground, that the pro- 
babilities are always in favour of " beliefs which have long 
existed and are widely diffused." "}• Now, if there be, in the 
wide range of human beliefs, one of which it can be said 
that it has existed long, and is widely diffused, it is that 
belief against which Mr. Spencer here urges the invidious 
argument of an a priori improbability. The belief in 
question is as old, and as widely spread, as the human race. 
There is no well-authenticated instance of any section or 
tribe of our species, which has not possessed the conviction 
that the universe, together with its living organisms, is the 
workmanship of an Almighty Creator. If this be an un- 
questionable fact, does it not follow, on Mr. Spencer's own 
showing, in his " First Principles," that there exists a very 
strong probability in favour of the truth of the new belief 
which he here antagonises on the assumption that the prob- 
abilities are against it } If his own principles are to be 
carried out in estimating this ancient, universal belief, there 
will be found, as the residuum, the primary, ineffaceable 
* " Principles of Biology," Vol. I., pp. 333-6. f " First Principles," pp. 3,4. 



BEGS THE QUESTION. 17 

truth, that whatever exhibits marks of design must have had 
ait intelligent author. When all the superstitions and crude 
notions wherewith the belief in creation has been associated, 
have been dissipated, this conviction abides. Constituted 
as the human mind is, it cannot ignore the evidence of the 
operation of mind presented in the universe, and must 
reject, as unphilosophical, any system of biology which 
dispenses with intelligence in the structure of earth's fauna 
and flora. 

2. That it assumes that man's primitive estate was that of a 
savage. As this assumption is contrary to historical facts, 
and has nothing to rest upon save a few remains of pre- 
historic man, which admit of interpretations differing 
widely from that put upon them by scientists of the school 
of Mr. Spencer, he need not be surprised if this, his primary 
assumption, be rejected as a mere begging of the question. 

3. That it assumes that all the tribes of the human race, 
existing throughout the earth at the time the remains in 
question were deposited, were in the estate indicated by the 
remains. Granting that the remains prove the savage estate 
of the individual and of the tribe to which he belonged., 
does it follow that other tribes, inhabiting other and more 
congenial regions of the earth, were in the same estate ? 
Men of science have need to be reminded of what the doctrine 
of Scripture on this point is. Scripture does not teach that 
the human race retained its moral integrity, or that each of 
the families into which it was divided retained the know- 
ledge possessed by the common ancestor. On the contrary, 
it tells a sad story of apostasy, dispersion, and degradation 
— a degradation retarded by special Divine interposition in 
the case of some, but allowed to go on in the case of others. 
If the morally degraded wandered away from the primitive 
seat of the race, and descended lower and lower in the 
scale the farther they receded from the parent stock and 
penetrated into uncongenial environments, might it not be 
expected that their remains would testify, as the remains in 
question do, to a low estate of civilisation } But what is 
there in all this to warrant the sweeping generalisation 



18 spencer's biological hypothesis. 

assumed by Mr. Spencer as a premiss from which to argue ? 
Do these instances, exhumed from European caves, warrant 
the conclusion, that the tribes resident in the Asiatic fontal 
centre, were, at the time indicated, in the same estate of 
social degradation ? Never was there a more unwarrant- 
able inference ; and yet it is assumed by some of the most 
eminent scientists of the day as absolutely unchallengeable ! 

4. In the next place it may be remarked, that the belief 
in the doctrine of a special creation can be proved, and has 
been proved historically, as well as by internal evidence, to 
have been handed down to us, not by savages, but by men 
whose writings demonstrate that they have no mental or 
moral superiors in the school of Mr. Spencer. On the score 
of its credibility, as well as of its harmony with scientific 
facts, we can afford to compare the cosmogony of Moses, or 
David, or Isaiah, or Paul, or Peter, with the biology of 
Herbert Spencer any day, notwithstanding all the advan- 
tage he has derived from the writings of Tyndall and 
Huxley, or the prelections of Professor Owen. 

5. However little store Mr. Spencer may set by primitive 
beliefs, if primitive man had not been possessed of some, he 
would never have ascribed the phenomena of his environ- 
ment to any cause whatever. And if we are to speak of the 
necessity of some of these beliefs as compared with others, 
we would specify one which is subversive of that form of 
the evolution hypothesis which he has set forth in his 
biology. The belief referred to is the intuitive, innate con- 
viction, that a phenomenon implies the existence and 
operation of a cause. This primary belief is universal, and 
involves the principle that the phenomenon reveals the 
attributes of the cause concerned in its production. It is, 
therefore, irreconcilable with the position, which is really 
the ultimate one of Mr. Spencer's biology — viz., that the 
ultimate cause is inscrutable. Either the principle which 
ascribes inscrutability to a cause is universal, or it is not. 
If it be universal, it must apply to immediate and proximate 
causes as well as to ultimate ; and if so, the immediate 
qause, to which we instinctively refer the phenomenon, is to 



BELONGS TO AN EXTINCT FAMILY OF BELIEFS. 19 

US, at the time of the reference, inscrutable and therefore 
unknown ; in which case the reference is as uninteUigent as 
it is unwarrantable. If it be alleged that it is not universal, 
but true only of the ultimate cause, the question arises, on 
what authority is this limitation of the dark attribute of 
inscrutability to the case of the ultimate cause made ? As 
already shown, there can be no reason for regarding the 
thing pronounced inscrutable a cause at all, which is not 
equally valid for denying its inscrutability. This belief is 
as old as humanity, and as wide as the human race; and it 
is fatal, not only to the specific argument which Mr. 
Spencer has tried to draw from the other alleged primitive 
beliefs with which the belief in the doctrine of a special 
creation is found to be associated, but fatal to the funda- 
mental principle of his whole system, which postulates the 
inscrutability of the ultimate cause. 

6. Moreover, it were very easy for the advocates of the 
doctrine of special creation to retort this argumentiun ad 
invidiam. Evolutionists should be the last to reproach 
their opponents with holding opinions " belonging to an 
almost extinct family of beliefs." It is not so long ago 
since we were told, on the high authority of the president 
of the British Association, that the evolution hypothesis 
was as old as the Greek philosophy. Now, however, if we 
are to credit Mr. Spencer, " it is a conception born in times 
of comparative enlightenment." We are quite ready to 
compare the enlightenment of the age of Moses with that 
of the age of Democritus, or to compare the prophets of 
Israel with the sages of Greece. And if we were to pass in 
review the various evolution hypotheses from the time of 
the Greek evolutionists to Mr. Spencer, we might be able 
to show that the one advocated by him belon^^s to a very 
large family of not only almost, but altogether, extinct 
hypotheses. Where now is the hypothesis of Thales, who 
held that water is the original of all things, and that God 
is the intelligence who from water formed all beius^s } or 
the hypothesis of Anaximander, who substituted an abso- 
lutely indeterminate thing called infinity for the elementary 



20 spencer's biological hypothesis. 

water of Thales ? or the hypothesis of Anaximines, who 
traced all things to air ? or that of Anaxagoras, who referred 
all things to a number of primitive elements called by him 
homoeomeriae ? Where now is the hypothesis of Pytha- 
goras, who deduced all things from a monad, embracing in 
its constitution both matter and spirit fused together into 
an absolute unity of substance ? or the same hypothesis as 
more fully developed into hylozoism by his followers ? 
What scientist would now accept, unmodified, the atomic 
theory of Democritus, who represented all things as pro- 
ceeding from eternal atoms possessing the same qualities 
and specific gravity, and differing only in size ; and that 
their general compounds, such as lead and iron, diff"er from 
each other merely in the arrangement of their atoms ? It 
is questionable whether even Professor Tyndall or Mr. 
Spencer would embark in the business of world-building 
with a stock of such atoms, however diverse in size, or how- 
ever unlimited in number. With atoms whose qualities are 
generated by their own movements, and whose movements 
are not the offspring of their previously existing qualities, 
it is more than probable that even our modern atomic chiefs 
might fail to construct even our inorganic world. And as 
to their entering upon the task with such material as water, 
or air, or the primitive elements of Anaximines, or the 
monad of Pythagoras, of course this were out of the question 
altogether. 

This brief review of some of the evolutionary hypotheses 
is sufficient to prove that, however it may be with others, 
evolutionists should be the last to speak of the presumption 
which exists against an opinion found associated with "an 
almost extinct family of beliefs." If Mr. Spencer's hypo- 
thesis is to be judged upon this principle, it must be con- 
demned ; for it is associated with a class of speculations 
which no scientist, except for the purpose of producing a 
temporary sensation, would entertain or endorse for a 
moment. 

Equally liable to retort is our author's next reason for 
rejecting the doctrine of a special creation. He alleges 



OPPOSED TO FACTS. 21 

that it is not countenanced by a single fact. " No one," he 
says, " ever saw a special creation." " No one," he adds, 
"ever found proof, of an indirect kind, that a special creation 
had taken place." Quoting a remark of Dr. Hooker's, he 
continues, " Naturalists who suppose new species to be 
miraculously originated, habitually suppose the origination 
to occur in some region remote from human observation. 
Wherever the order of organic nature is exposed to the 
view of zoologists and botanists, it expels this conception ; 
and the conception survives only in connection with ima- 
gined places, where the order of organic phenomena is 
unknown."* 

Here is an appeal to facts, and we accept the authority 
invoked. It is a fact that no one ever saw a new species of 
organism created ; but it is also a fact that no one ever saw 
one brought into existence by a process of evolution ; and 
it is a fact that no one ever found proof, of an indirect 
kind, that such an evolution of new species had taken place. 
Wherever the order of organic nature is exposed to the 
view of zoologists and botanists, as in the case already 
quoted from Professor Huxley's sermon on the origin of 
species, it expels the Spencerian conception of evolution 
without the intervention of intelligence, and supplants it by 
the irresistible conviction that the process of organisation 
is under the guidance of a skilful artist ; and the conception 
for which the authority of facts is claimed by Mr. Spencer 
survives only in connection with flights of the so-called 
scientific imagination, by which the vision is prolonged 
backwards beyond the boundary of experimental evidence. 
There is not a single fact presented in these two volumes 
which gives the slightest countenance to the hypothesis 
which its author advocates ; nor is there one which, 
when fully analysed, does not add strength to the argu- 
ment in support of a presiding intelligence and a special 
creation. 

After the author had reached the 351st page of his first 
volume, he felt constrained to make the following confes- 

♦ " Principles of Biology," Vol. I., p. 336. 



22 spencer's biological hypothesis. 

sion : — " Though the facts at present assignable in direct 
proof that, by progressive nmodifications, races of organisms 
that are apparently distinct may result from antecedent 
races are not sufficient, yet there are numerous facts of the 
order required." Is this not a distinct and explicit acknow- 
ledgment that no one has ever seen the evolution of a new 
species } If he regards this fact as furnishing an argument 
against special creation, how can he refuse to admit its 
force as against his own evolution hypothesis ? 

But if he has not direct proof sufficient for the establishing 
of this hypothesis, he has, he informs us, " numerous facts 
of the order required." What are these facts } Here they 
are : — " It has been shown beyond all question, that unlike- 
nesses of structure gradually arise among descendants from 
the same stock. We find that there is going on a modi- 
fying process of the kind alleged as the source of specific 
differences — a process which, though slow in its action, does, 
in time, produce conspicuous changes — a process which, to 
all appearance, would produce in millions of years, and 
under the great varieties of conditions which geological 
records imply, any amount of change."* And yet he con- 
fesses that the palaeontolog}' of these records cannot 
be held to prove evolution, and that only some few of them 
yield it support ! "f" 

Such, then, are the facts ; what is their value in 
this argument ? It will be observed that while IMr. 
Spencer speaks of the gradual rise of unlikenesses of 
structure among descend :nts from the same stock, he has 
not ventured to say that these have, in any instance, 
amounted to the origination of a new species, and that he 
confesses that palseontolog}' does not furnish a single 
instance. All he says is, that this fact is of the order 
required! His hypothesis requires structural change, and 
here is a fact of this class. It is true the change to which 
it testifies is not great enough lor his purpose ; but it 
"bears as great a ratio to the brief period in which it has 
been produced," as the whole change required " bears to 
♦ " Principles of Biolog>-," Vol I., p. 351. + Ibia, p. 399. 



CHANGES REQUIRED DO NOT EXIST. 23 

that vast period during which Hving forms have existed on 
the earth." This is very Uke a confession which Mr. 
Darwin makes at the close of his remarks on the effects of 
increased or decreased use of parts. " Although man," he 
concludes, "may not have been much modified during the 
latter stages of his existence through the increased or 
decreased use of parts, the facts now given show that his 
liability in this respect has not been lost ; and we positively 
know that the same law holds good with the lower animals." 
Such is his confession ; what is his conclusion .? With an 
inferential boldness that brooks no barrier, he adds : — 
"Consequently (!) we may infer, that when, at a remote 
epoch, the progenitors of man were in a transitional 
state, and were changing from quadrupeds into bipeds, 
natural selection would probably have been greatly 
aided by the inherited effects of the increased or dim- 
inished use of the different parts of the body"!* It is 
truly painful to observe in the writings of these really 
able men, so persistent an endeavour to establish their 
favourite hypotheses by facts which they are compelled to 
admit do not furnish the evidence required. Frustrated by 
the facts, not only of historic and prehistoric times, but of 
palaeontology also, they overleap the boundary of experi- 
mental evidence, and assume transitions and structural 
changes which they have failed to prove. When the facts 
adduced, even as estimated by themselves, do not give the 
slightest indication of a specific change, they comfort them- 
selves with the reflection that changes of the class observed 
must, if continued long enough, effect the change required ! 
Of course, a change of the right kind, however small in 
amount, if increased by however small an increment, must, 
if unchecked, at some future epoch of duration, amount to 
the quantum required ; but only if unchecked. Ay, there's 
the rub — only on the assumption that the change shall be 
unchecked ! What warrant is there for this assumption .■* 
Certainly there is none in the phenomena of the observed 
changes of the cosmos. 

* " Descent of Man," Vol. i., p. 121. 



24 spencer's biological hypothesis. 

Speaking of the external factors of evolution, Mr. Spencer 
refers to the fact, that our earth, in its annual motion round 
the sun, does not move constantly along a rigid, unvarying 
curve, but along a curve constant in its inconstancy — now 
approaching a circle, and anon an ellipse. This change is a 
very slow one, and the cycle which embraces its extremes has 
the astounding range of one or two millions of years. Now 
suppose that an astronomer, who was not aware of the 
demonstrations of La Place, were watching the movements 
of our globe referred to, and observed that, in a given 
period, the divergence towards a more eccentric curve 
amounted to several miles, might he not, if he reasoned 
with Mr. Spencer and the evolutionists, begin to apprehend 
an elongation of the major axis of its orbit, and a shortening 
of the minor, which must eventually evolve extremes of 
heat and cold absolutely destructive of organic life in our 
world .<* As an evolutionist, he might thus reason ; but the 
scientific astronomer would inform him that his fears were 
groundless, and had their origin in a too narrow induction. 
He would allay his alarm by assuring him that this variation 
in the orbit of the earth has its limits, and that when these 
were reached, the apparently errant orb would swing gra- 
dually back to the less hazardous curve. 

Now we charge upon the evolutionists the perpetration 
of a like error, in their argument from the observed 
structural changes which have been induced, or developed, 
in vegetable and animal organisms. The organic variation 
has been shown, again and again, to have bounds set to it 
which it cannot pass. Even Mr. Darwin, as quoted by 
Mr. Spencer, remarks that "'sports' are extremely rare 
under nature, but far from rare under cultivation." And 
Mr. Spencer himself admits* that competent judges do 
not doubt that our extremely variable domestic animals 
have become variable under the changed conditions im- 
plied in domestication, and holds that these animals were 
constant prior to their subjection to man. Is this not a 
palpable surrender of the very citadel of evolution ? It 
* " Principles of Biology," Vol. i., p. 262. 



VARIATION ESSENTIAL TO SPECIFIC LIFE. 25 

is neither more nor less than an acknowledgment that 
constancy is the rule, whilst variation is the exception ; 
or, as Mr. Spencer puts it, " the wild race maintains its 
type with great persistence," whilst " the domestic race 
frequently produces individuals more unlike the average 
type than the parents are." * " The life of a species, like 
that of an individual," he says, "is maintained by the 
unequal and ever-varying actions of incident forces on its 
different parts." -[- 

This is conclusive, but it is conclusive against the evolu- 
tion hypothesis. If, as Mr. Spencer has shown, variation is 
essential to specific life, what becomes of the notion, that 
by the operation of this same law of variation, new species 
can be originated } Can the causes which are held to be 
capable of transmuting one species into another, be held 
capable of rendering such transmutation impossible 1 If uni- 
formity, as " inter-breeding" demonstrates, produces specific 
deterioration, whilst variation, as those skilled in cattle- 
breeding inform us, promotes the well-being, and tends to 
the perfection of the species, surely it is most unwarrantable 
to infer, that variation may eventually result in specific 
destruction by improving one species into another. It is 
no wonder, then, that these two classes of related facts led 
Mr. Spencer to enunciate the foregoing remarkable law of 
specific life. The law, as we have seen, is universal, extend- 
ing to the very orbs of heaven. The stability of the 
universe, as well as the stability of the species of earth's 
fauna and flora, is maintained by variations which are 
limited and bounded by an unseen power which ever acts 
in reference to the original type, and maintains its image, 
substantially, in every individual movement or organism, 
through the instrumentality of the very forces which evolu- 
tionists regard as all-potent to effect its destruction. 

The case of a particular family, in which digital 
variation occurred, adduced in support of the evolution 
hypothesis, I will serve to illustrate this point. The case is 

* " Principles of Biology," Vol. I., p. 261. f Ibid, p. 286. 

X Ibidy pp. 258-60. 



26 spencer's biological hypothesis. 

cited from an essay by Dr. Struthers, and the conclusion 
drawn is quoted with approval by ]\Ir. Spencer. After 
stating the history of the variation through four genera- 
tions, Dr. Struthers, referring to a daughter who was born 
with six fingers on each hand and six toes on each foot, 
says, " In this, the most interesting sub-branch of the 
descent, we see digital increase, which appeared in the first 
generation on one limb, appearing in the second on two 
limbs, the hands ; in the third on three limbs, the hands and 
one foot ; in the fourth on all the four limbs. There is as 
yet no fifth generation in uninterrupted transmission of the 
variety. The variety does not yet occur in any number of 
the fifth generation of Esther's descendants" (the female 
ancestor to whom the variety is traced back), " which con- 
sists as yet only of three boys and one girl, whose parents 
were normal, and of two boys and two girls, whose grand- 
parents were normal. It is not known whether, in the 

case of the great-grandmother, Esther P , the variety 

was original or inherited." 

Such is the case ; what conclusion does it warrant.'* Does 
it prove that variation may go on indefinitely ? or does 
it prove that it is held in check by a specific law restraining 
it, like the motions of the planets, within unalterable limits ? 
The case proves that the normal type rules ; for in the 
generations specified, only six instances of variation occur, 
whilst there are one hundred and two of the normal type .-' 
If ]\Ir. Spencer can adduce nothing in favour of his hypo- 
thesis better than a woman who has acquired, through the 
mystic process of evolution, three digits more than her 
great-grandmother, he had better be a little more modest in 
his averments about the absence of evidence in support of 
the doctrine of a special creation. It would, indeed, seem 
as if he felt the weakness and unprofitableness of this argu- 
ment ; for he immediately tries to buttress it with an a priori 
borrowed from his " First Principles," to the effect, that 
an idea which cannot be presented to the mind in a definite 
shape or form, is a false idea, and is to be rejected. In 
addition to what has been said on the point here raised, 



SPENCER ABANDONS HIS CRUCIAL TEST. 27 

when speaking of the impossibility of regarding an inscrut- 
able thing as a cause, it may be sufficient to cite a passage 
from Mr. Spencer's " Principles of Psychology," from which 
it appears that he does not always regard the unimaginable- 
ness of a thing as a sufficient reason for rejecting it. 
Avowing " the belief that mind and nervous action are the 
subjective and objective faces of the same thing," he con- 
fesses that " we remain utterly incapable of seeing, and 
even of imagining, how the two are related. Mind," he 
adds, " still continues to us a something without any kin- 
ship to the other things ; and from the science which 
discovers by introspection the laws of this something, there 
is no passage by transitional steps to the sciences which 
discover the laws of these other things." * 

Here, then, is a belief which cannot abide the crucial test 
of one of Mr. Spencer's first principles, and yet he holds it ! 
If he can hold this belief despite its inconceivableness, with 
what show of consistency can he reject, on the ground of 
its inconceivableness, the belief in the doctrine of a special 
creation ? To quote his own words, at the close of this 
argument against the Scripture doctrine, if " belief, properly 
so-called, implies a mental representation of the thing 
believed ; and," as he confesses, " no such mental repre- 
sentation is here possible." how can he believe that there is 
any relation between " those thoughts and feelings which 
constitute consciousness," and the action of the nervous 
system ? In a word, then, even though the doctrine 
objected to were that of the creation of an organism, ex 
nihilo, Mr. Spencer could not consistently reject it on the 
ground specified. As the common and Scriptural doctrine, 
so far as organisms is concerned, is not that of a direct 
creation ex niJiilo, but a mediate creation out of previously 
existing matter, Mr. Spencer is constrained to frame his 
objection so as to meet this aspect of the question. This 
hypothesis, he alleges, involves, ultimately, " the creation of 
force ; and the creation of force is just as inconceivable as 
the creation of matter." He asks, ** The myriad atoms 

* " Principles of Psychology," Vol. I., pp. 140-56. 



28 spencer's biological hypothesis. 

going to the composition of the new organism, all of them 
previously dispersed through the neighbouring air and 
earth, does each, suddenly disengaging itself from its com- 
binations, rush to meet the rest, unite with them into the 
appropriate chemical compounds, and then fall with certain 
others into its appointed place in the aggregate of complex 
tissues and organs ?" This, he says, is " to assume a myriad 
of supernatural impulses, differing in their directions and 
amounts, given to as many different atoms," and is, there- 
fore, " a multiplication of mysteries rather than a solution 
of a mystery. Every one of these impulses, not being the 
result of a force locally existing in some other form, implies 
the creation of force ; and the creation of force is just as 
inconceivable as the creation of matter." 

Now, it will be observed that Mr, Spencer has some 
difficulty in bringing his mental-representation principle 
into conflict with the doctrine of the creation of organisms 
out of existing matter. Not only is the doctrine, on his 
own showing, capable of mental presentation, but he 
has himself given us a sketch of the process. He has 
figured the atoms disengaging themselves and entering 
into new combinations, and taking, as if by magic, their 
places in the aggregate of complex tissues and organs. 
He has put before us a process not unlike the process 
of crystallisation, so beautifully described by Professor 
Tyndall in his " Fragments of Science," and in his late 
Manchester lecture on " Crystalline and Molecular Forces," 
and one which is actually realised in the evolution of the 
animal from the embryo, as described by Professor 
Huxley. In the following passage, Dr. Tyndall gives a very 
graphic sketch of the process by which, materialists allege, 
the thing pronounced by Mr. Spencer to be inconceivable, 
may be done. 

" And now let us pass from what we are accustomed to 
regard as a dead mineral to a living grain of corn. When 
it is examined by polarised light, chromatic phenomena 
similar to those noticed in crystals are observed. And 
why } Because the architecture of the grain resembles the 



CONTRADICTS TYNDALL'S HYPOTHESIS. 29 

architecture of the crystal. In the grain also the molecules 
are set in definite positions, and in accordance with their 
arrangement they act upon the light. But what has built 
together the molecules of the corn ? I have already said, 
regarding crystalline architecture, that you may, if you 
please, consider the atoms and molecules to be placed in 
position by a power external to themselves. The same 
hypothesis is open to you now. But if in the case of 
crystals you have rejected this notion of an external 
architect, I think you are bound to reject it now, and to 
conclude that the molecules of the corn are self-posited by 
the forces with which they act upon each other. It would 
be poor philosophy to invoke an external agent in the one 
case, and to reject it in the other. 

" Instead of cutting our grain of corn into slices, and 
subjecting it to the action of polarised light, let us place 
it in the earth, and subject it to a certain degree of warmth. 
In other words, let the molecules, both of the corn and 
of the surrounding earth, be kept in that state of agitation 
which we call warmth. Under these circumstances, the 
grain, and the substances which surround it, interact, and 
a definite molecular architecture is the result. A bud is 
formed ; this bud reaches the surface, where it is exposed 
to the sun's rays, which are also to be regarded as a kind 
of vibratory motion. And as the motion of common heat 
with which the grain and the substances surrounding it 
were first endowed, enabled the grain and these substances 
to exercise their attractions and repulsions, and thus to 
coalesce in definite forms, so the specific motion of the 
sun's rays now enables the green bud to feed upon the 
carbonic acid and the aqueous vapour of the air. The bud 
appropriates those constituents of both for which it has an 
elective attraction, and permits the other constituent to 
resume its place in the air. Thus the architecture is 
carried on. Forces are active at the root, forces are active 
in the blade, the matter of the earth and the matter of the 
atmosphere are drawn towards the root and blade, and the 
plant augments in size. We have in succession the buel, 



30 spencer's biological hypothesis. 

the stalk, the ear, the full corn in the ear ; the cycle of 
molecular action being completed by the production of 
grains similar to that with which the process began. 

"Now there is nothing in this process which necessarily 
eludes the conceptive or imagining power of the purely 
human mind. An intellect the same in kind as our own 
would, if only sufficiently expanded, be able to follow the 
whole process from beginning to end. It would see every 
molecule placed in its position by the specific attractions 
and repulsions exerted between it and other molecules, 
the whole process and its consummation being an instance 
of the play of molecular force. Given the grain and its 
environment, the purely human intellect might, if suffi- 
ciently expanded, trace out a priori every step of the 
process of growth, and by the application of purely 
mechanical principles demonstrate that the cycle must end, 
as it is seen to end, in the production of forms like that 
with which it began. A similar necessity rules here to 
that which rules the planets in their circuits round the 
sun. 

" You will notice that I am stating my truth strongly, as 
at the beginning we agreed it should be stated. But I 
must go still further, and affirm that in the eye of science 
the ariirnal body is just as much the product of molecular 
force as the stalk and ear of corn, or as the crystal of salt 
or sugar. Many of the parts of the body are obviously 
mechanical. Take the human heart, for example, with its 
system of valves, or take the exquisite mechanism of the 
eye or hand. Animal heat, moreover, is the same in kind 
as the heat of a fire, being produced by the same chemical 
process. Animal motion, too, is as directly derived from 
the food of the animal, as the motion of Trevethyck's 
walking-engine from the fuel in its furnace. As regards 
matter, the animal body creates nothing ; as regards force, 
it creates nothing. ' Which of you by taking thought can 
add one cubit to his stature .''' All that has been said, then, 
regarding the plant may be re-stated with regard to the 
animal. Every particle that enters into the composition of 



SPENCER FAILS IN APPLYING HIS CRUCIAL TEST. 31 

a muscle, a nerve, or a bone, has been placed in its position 
by molecular force. And unless the existence of law in 
these matters be denied, and the element of caprice intro- 
duced, we must conclude that, given the relation of any 
molecule of the body to its environment, its position in the 
body might be determined mathematically. Our difficulty 
is not with the quality of the problem, but with its com- 
plexity ; and this difficulty might be met by the simple 
expansion of the faculties which we now possess. Given 
this expansion, with the necessary molecular data, and the 
chick might be deduced as rigorously and as logically from 
the Qgg as the existence of Neptune from the disturbances 
of Uranus, or as conical refraction from the undulatory 
theory of light."* 

So far, therefore, as Mr. Spencer's own crucial test is 
concerned, Dr. Tyndall has shown that the doctrine of 
creation out of existing matter can abide the ordeal. It 
may be said, and is said, that the hypothesis postulates " the 
necessary molecular data," or, as Mr. Spencer says, organic 
matter, to begin with; but if vital, and chemical, and me- 
chanical forces be, as the school of Mr. Spencer would have 
us believe, both quantitative and qualitative equivalents, 
surely one who is master of the laws of chemical and 
mechanical forces ought to be able to construct living organ- 
isms, without creating a new force. If vital forces be the 
same both in quality and quantity with chemical and 
mechanical forces, there can be no difficulty about producing 
vegetable or animal embryos. 

It was doubtless this fact which led him to fall back, by 
way of supplement, on the creation ex ftihilo hypothesis, 
which he had, in his own opinion, already demolished. The 
doctrine of a creation out of existing matter, involves, 
ultimately, the doctrine of " the creation of force ; and the 
creation of force is just as inconceivable as the creation of 
matter." This is the fable of the wolf and the lamb over 
again. If you did not do it, your father or grandfather 
did, and you must pay the forfeit. 

* " Fragments of Science," pp. 1 16-1 19. 



32 spencer's biological hypothesis. 

Here, then, is a plain issue raised by Mr. Spencer, and 
we accept it. The question at issue is simply this — Does 
the disintegration and reintegration of matter imply the crea- 
tion of force.'' The mere statement of the question is sufficient 
for any man competent to form an opinion on the subject 
in dispute. If the process referred to involves the creation 
of a force not " locally existing in some other form," how 
is it that processes of disintegration and integration can be 
carried on by chemists, who have confessedly no power of 
creating new forces ? The disengagement of atoms, and 
the recombination of them into new compounds, pronounced 
impossible except on the assumption of the creation of a 
new force not locally existing in some other form, take 
place in every instance of chemical analysis and synthesis, 
without any such adventitious aid. All that is needed in 
either case is an operator possessing the requisite know- 
ledge of the elements concerned. If the chemist can perform 
such wonders in his laboratory without the help of a new 
force, is it incredible that the author of the elements should 
be able to employ them in the construction of living 
organisms } There is no escape here possible to an evolu- 
tionist of the school of Spencer. If vital force be the 
correlate of chemical and mechanical, the origination of 
life cannot, as Mr. Spencer alleges, imply the creation of a 
force not previously existing. It is, therefore, only on the 
assumption that vital force is not the correlate of mere 
material forces, that Mr Spencer's objection can have any 
meaning. The thing assumed, however, is fatal to his 
biological hypothesis, which rests, ultimately, on the con- 
vertibility of material forces into vital. 

Assuming that those who hold the^ doctrine of special 
creation regard the demonstration of divine power made 
in the origination of species as designed solely for the 
benefit of mankind, Mr. Spencer asks, to whom was the 
demonstration made ? As " the great majority of these 
supposed special creations took place before mankind 
existed, to what purpose," he asks, "were the millions of 
these demonstrations which took place on the earth when 



MANIFESTS IGNORANCE OF DOCTRINE OF CREATION. 33 

there were no intelligent beings to contemplate them ? 
Did the Unknowable thus demonstrate His own power to 
Himself? Few," he remarks, "will have the hardihood to 
say that any such demonstration was needful. There is no 
choice but to regard them either as superfluous exercises of 
power, which is a derogatory supposition ; or as exercises 
of power that were necessary because species could not 
be otherwise produced, which is also a derogatory sup- 
position." * 

Now, in the first place, no person properly instructed in 
the Scriptures would, for a moment, think of representing 
the entire series of creative acts as having for their sole end 
the demonstration of the power of God to man. Other 
ends by no means derogatory to the Creator may be 
assumed, such as delight in the exercise of His wisdom, and 
power, and bounty,, and sovereignty. Mr. Spencer assumes 
that if His acts had not reference to man alone, they must 
have been designed to demonstrate His power to Himself, 
or were necessary because species could not be otherwise 
produced — both of which suppositions, he alleges, are 
derogatory. As we have seen, the alternative assumed is 
not the only one open to the advocates of special creations. 
Besides the one mentioned above, the student of the Bible 
can specify many others. It were not a derogatory sup- 
position that God, in those remote creations, was demon- 
strating His attributes to other orders of intelligences 
of which the Scriptures speak, and against whose existence 
science has no facts to urge. Or it might be said in reply, 
that as the Author of the earth, with its successive orders 
of vegetable and animal organisms, knew that in the latter 
days scoffers would arise, who would call in question His 
existence, and endeavour to prove that all organic forms 
were evolved from uncreated matter, by an impersonal 
power resident in matter itself, or conditioned by it, He 
so ordered the manifestations of life on our globe, as to 
show that the links of the great biological chain have been 
separately created, and not consecutively evolved. 
* " Principles of Biology," Vol. I., p. 339. 



34 spencer's biological hypothesis. 

-And lastly, it may be observed, that if this earth were to 
furnish a text-book for geologists, it was necessary that it 
should be printed before it was published or read. If our 
earth was to instruct men, and serve as a school for their 
mental and moral discipline, it was essential that, prior to 
their matriculation, it should be properly furnished. That 
admirable scholastic arrangements have been made, is 
attested by the earnest competition and enthusiasm dis- 
played by the ever-increasing band of scientists who crowd 
its halls ; and few who have thoroughly investigated the 
problems prepared for them, have ever imagined that they 
were propounded by a blind, unintelligent, unconscious force. 

Mr. Spencer regards it as an objection to the doctrine of 
special creation, that beings endowed with capacities for 
wide thought and high feeling did not exist on our globe 
millions of years before man appeared. The answer has 
been given already, and is obvious. It is simply this — Our 
globe was not fit at an earlier stage to receive such beings. 
Special creation does not set aside order and adaptation ; 
and is perfectly consistent with an original incandescent 
state of our globe watched over by the Creator, who, at the 
proper stages in its history, introduced such organisms as 
were suited to its condition, and fitted to prepare it as a 
dwelling-place for man. 

Equally unhappy is the argument against design drawn 
from the structure of animals of prey, exhibiting, as such 
structures do, countless pain-inflicting appliances — appli- 
ances which have been doing their deadly work all through 
the geological eras. " How happens it," our author asks, 
" that animals were so designed as to render this bloodshed 
necessary ?"* For the advocate of design, he alleges, there 
is but the one alternative — viz., that the Creator was either 
unable or unwilling to make animals so as to avoid the 
infliction of such misery. Still greater, he thinks, is the 
difficulty when we consider that branch of the arrangement 
in which provision is made for the support of the inferior 
by the sacrifice of the superior, as in the case of parasites. 

* " Principles of Biology," Vol. i., p. 341. 



ASSUMES BENEFICENCE AS ESSENTIAL TO DESIGN. 35 

To these objections we reply, that they assume several 
things which are not conceded. I. They assume that the 
design of creation, as held by teleologists, is the production 
of the greatest possible amount of happiness throughout 
the entire orders of organic, sentient life. For this 
assumption, there is no warrant to be found either in tele- 
ology, or in nature. There is a manifest subordination 
running throughout the whole chain of sentient existence, 
from the moUusk to the man. No inferior order lives for 
itself or simply for its own enjoyment. It is a link in a 
series constituting one great whole, from which no member 
can be removed without causing universal detriment, and 
the final link of which lives, not for himself, but for Him 
to whom he owes his being. The theology of the whole 
maybe expressed in one sentence : each inferior order not for 
itself, but for a higher ; all the inferior for man, and man for 
God. Such is the testimony of the organic worlds, and 
such is the doctrine of man's moral nature and of the Word 
of God. In this system there is suffering, but it is none the 
less in harmony with the facts. 

2. Mr. Spencer's objections assume that if we cannot 
point out a beneficent design, there is no proof of design 
at all. Such an objection may possibly have force with 
one under the fascination of an hypothesis which he would 
fondly sustain against all comers ; but no man, whose mind 
is not warped by prejudice, can for a moment believe that 
benevolence is a necessary element in design. Any arrange- 
ment embracing means for the attainment of a definite end 
carries with it evidence of design, and is so regarded by all 
men as soon as the arrangement and the end are appre- 
hended. It matters not whether the end be benevolent or 
malign, whether the arrangement be ingenious or clumsy, 
the moment the connexion between the means employed 
and the end aimed at, is discovered, the mind instinctively 
infers a design and a designer. The horn of the sword-fish, 
the teeth of the lion, the talons of the eagle, are regarded 
by all men, whether evolutionists or creationists, as instru- 
ments of design ; and the philosopher who challenges the 



36 spencer's biological hypothesis. 

e ifence does but proclaim his folly, and reveal his pie- 

5. It is ob^-u? th^t Mr. Spencer's objectioiis to the 
doctrine of r _ .r irs-vm. not from the facts under 
in^'estigatic:., lu: : ;~ :r .1 : : :-:r ces in rer^rd to the 
r:T"e::5 of this doctrine upon our views of thr : .racter of 
'--'-- - ri::r. He finds organisms not construe:- ^ : as to 
z:z -t : . : ; .: iTering, and immediately concludes tha: : j ; 5 rr*. s 
have not been designed. Why? Because tl; . _ : 
"-5: hive e::..-. ;een unable or unwilling to design : :. 
5 : : : prevent suffering. This alternative he thinks ':::.. 
~: :.- i : ::rine of dti_ : li it either c?.i:s ir. imputation on 
: e Divine character or involves a lir: : : :* the Divine 

Now. as we h?..e ./:t?-i ftt: :.:: re: ::ion of the 
~ir 5 ifdesi^ :: t upon :vr ivracter of the 

r: e }, 7:.ti at in the : : r.z:/ iriz ; : f :-ie adap- 

tation of the means :: : e 1::. : .r.: :: :. t z:: itever 

the erf "ay be. T :_: : :ei as we are, it is acr .:ely 
i . : . : 5 i 3ie to disco\ e r 5 _ : . - : : ition without imrr. e e . : r 

: 7 ; . design and a designer. This is a first p r : 
which the human mind cann:: rev" zuish without doing 

: :'ence to its own constitution. It is, in fact, but another 
lord of the principle, th = : e e e~e:: must have a cause. 
Tv view of this fi::. it is n.:vv --: : .: :'.e onlj' course op>en 
:: :. r irripugner of the c: ::r ; 3i design, is to meet the 
: - - ^ V : on the question 01 laci, and to prove that animal 
ir e z_v:: .r'r organisms bear in their structure no traces 
:: ee ^vi, if he cannot do this (and Mr. Spencer'? ""-': 
I r;-. by leaving it not only undone but ur.?-::ev 
v^ : -^roof that he cannot), he must sjrr .ie- : 
^ V : V . -tead of facing the facts and dive ^ 

o; L^^-- f design which the human m;e.- ...^:...^- 

tively re^-^- r-ur author carefiilly evades the real 

question -'r '-- . :i raises an entirely distinct one respect- 
ing the : - -'Dctrine of design upon our \-iews of 
the Div: , icter. This procedure is as unmanly as it 

♦ " Principles of Biology,' VoL L, p. 341. 



spencer's dilemmas examined. 37 

is unphilosophical and unscientific. It is unmanly not to 
face the facts presented in the structures of the fauna and 
flora of our world ; and it is unphilosophical and unscientific 
not to follow out, to their legitimate conclusions, irrespec- 
tive of imaginary ulterior consequences, the principles 
revealed by a fair analysis of the phenomena they present. 
With a philosopher, the question is not, " What effect will a 
fair interpretation of these facts have upon some other 
doctrine ?" but simply, " What do the facts, fairly interpreted, 
teach .'*" To borrow a manly and truly philosophical 
sentiment, uttered by Professor Huxley in his address 
before the late meeting of the British Association, 
" Logical consequences are the scarecrows of fools and the 
beacons of wise men."* Theologians are not afraid of the 
logical consequences of the doctrine of design upon their 
views of the Divine character ; nor will Mr. Spencer be able 
to turn them aside from the question at issue, by hanging 
up, for the thousandth time, the old weather-beaten scare- 
crow of optimism, fashioned, to suit his own purpose, out of 
the straw of a false speculative theology. 

Of course, if the God of the Bible be the God assumed in 
Mr. Spencer's critique on His works, and the end aimed at 
by Him be the end ascribed to Him by His reviewer, it 
might be difficult to reconcile the actual phenomena of the 
organic world with the character of such a Being. If the 
Creator possess but two attributes — benevolence and power 
— and if His design in creation be the production of the 
greatest possible amount of happiness, it might puzzle the 
ablest of optimists to reconcile those pain-inflicting con- 
trivances which abound in the actual organic arrangement, 
with the character, and aim, and capacities of this optimistic 
Deity. But as the God of the Bible possesses more attributes 
than the two specified, and sets before Him higher ends 
than the mere happiness of His creatures — as He is holy 
and just, as well as almighty and benevolent, and regards 
the interests of His moral creatures as superior to those of 
the mere sentient orders of animal organisms, and considers 
* "Fortnightly Review," Nov., 1874, p. 577. 



38 spencer's biological hypothesis. 

their moral culture a higher end than their happiness, yea, 
has linked their happiness to their moral and spiritual 
character, and set His own glory before them as their 
highest end, and the source of their highest enjoyment — as 
this is the character, and these the aims, of the God of the 
Bible, Mr. Spencer's objections are as irrelevant as the 
premises on which they are based are false. As our critic 
cannot take in the whole issues of the mighty cycle em- 
braced in that plan of which these phenomena strewn on 
the shores of time are but the initial movements, it is 
nothing short of arrogance to pronounce, as he has ventured 
to do, upon the moral character of the Author of the system. 

4. Mr, Spencer's objections proceed upon the assumption, 
that a theory which does not account for every class of 
phenomena, however remotely connected with the subject 
under investigation, is, ipso facto ^ discredited. For example, 
as in the present instance, if the advocate of design cannot 
solve the problem of the ultimate design of the various 
orders of animal and vegetable organisms, he is not to be 
permitted to speak of the immediate and proximate design 
of these closely correlated kingdoms of nature. If he cannot 
tell why, or for what ultimate end, God made great whales, 
and then constructed sword-fish equipped with a weapon 
for their destruction, he must be told that he has failed to 
prove that either whales or sword-fish are the offspring of 
design ! If a teleologist cannot tell why God created acari 
to burrow in the skin and torture man, he has failed to 
prove that either man or his tormentors exhibit marks of 
intelligent purpose ! If he cannot take in the vast range 
of organic relations (embracing, as multitudinous orders do, 
organisms which nothing but the most powerful microscope 
can reveal), and grasp the scheme of creation in its entirety, 
he is not entitled to speak of any class of relations as 
evincing contrivance ! 

In a word, so long as anything remains unexplained, 
nothing is explained. Will any scientist accept this prin- 
ciple } Will any astronomer venture to affirm that Kepler 
had explained nothing, when he enunciated the law that 



INCONSISTENT IN BELIEVING THE INCONCEIVABLE. 39 

" planets revolve In elliptic orbits about the sun, which 
occupies the common focus of all these orbits," because he 
had not then discovered the second great law, that " if a 
line be drawn from the centre of the sun to any planet, this 
line, as it is carried forward by the planet, will sweep over 
equal areas in equal portions of time"? Or, is it to be held 
that the foregoing laws explain nothing, because Kepler 
had yet to ponder the relations of the members of the solar 
system for seventeen years before he discovered the third 
law, that the squares of the periodic times of the planets are 
to each other as the cubes of their mean distances from the 
sun ? Are all these laws to be repudiated, because their 
discoverer was not able to tell why the orbits of the planets 
and satellites should be ellipses rather than any other curve, 
or to tell, as Newton has done, what power holds these 
mighty masses " steady in their swift career, producing the 
most exquisite harmony of motion, and a uniformity of 
result as steady as the march of time."* W.ll Mr. Spencer 
abandon the evolution hypothesis, because, as confessed by 
himself, it does not explain the connexion of consciousness 
with nervous action } Will he give up his hypothesis because 
of its failure to explain this mysterious relationship.-* Tele- 
ologists are entitled to press this question with all the con- 
fidence of an a fortiori^ for they are asking evolutionists to 
give up a hypothesis for which there is no positive proof, 
and which fails, absolutely and confessedly, at the most 
important point in the evolutionary sequence ; whilst, on 
the other hand, the doctrine of design is engraven on 
every organism within the realm of organic nature, and 
engraven so manifestly, that the ablest advocate of 
the evolution hypothesis — the philosopher of the school — 
has nothing to advance against it, save certain consequences 
which he alleges flow from it — consequences which, as we 
have already seen, lie only against a speculative, theological 
optimism, which has no basis in the word of God. 

In a word, then, it is only by petty criticisms, based on 
the assumption that the theology of the Bible is optimistic, 
* Mitchell's "Orbs of Heaven," p. 71. 



40 spencer's biological hypothesis. 

that this prince of evolutionists can make even a show of 
argument against the doctrine of design in creation. His 
assumption is false, and his critique pointless and worthless. 
To use his own language in his estimate of the doctrine he 
assails, his hypothesis must be pronounced worthless — 
"worthless by its derivation," from Democritus and Lu- 
cretius ; " worthless in its intrinsic incoherence," as de- 
manding continuity, and yet admitting the existence of 
impassable gulfs between the most important elements in 
the series; "worthless as absolutely without evidence," no 
evolutionist having as yet been able to point to the evolution 
of a single new fertile species from any other ; " worthless 
as not supplying an intellectual need," failing, as it does, 
to conform to the primary belief that evidence of design 
implies the existence of a designer ; " worthless as not 
satisfying a moral want," repudiating, as it does, the very 
idea of the existence of a personal, moral intelligence, who 
sustains to us the relations of Creator, Governor, and Judge. 
"We must, therefore, consider it as counting for nothing, in 
opposition to" that Scripture doctrine of Creation which 
fulfils all these conditions, and meets all the intellectual and 
moral requirements of our nature. Constituted as man is, 
he cannot rest in any theory of this wondrous universe, 
which does not place an omnipotent moral Intelligence 
first in the absolute order of existence, as the efficient cause 
of all forces, whether chemical, mechanical, vital, or mental. 



1 



fiJl^O. ^ . 



Wi\t g^^tijin^ jjf ait 3m^i^i|f3jJital dxrd. 



REV. W. TODD MARTIN, M.A. 



LIFE AND CHARACTER OF CHRIST. 



-♦^♦♦4- 



THE evidences of the truth of Christianity are manifold 
and varied, addressing themselves not only to different 
types of mind, but also to different parts of our mental and 
moral nature. One of the strongest and most convincing 
of these is to be found in the life and character of Christ as 
portrayed in the gospels. To set forth the nature and value 
of this evidence is the object of the present lecture. In the 
time at our disposal it will not be possible to do more than 
give an outline of the argument derivable from this source. 

We have in our hands four writings or compositions, 
generally known as "The Gospels;" and according to the 
present results of criticism, the first of these was in existence 
before A.D. 70, the second and third some few years later, 
and the fourth about the close of the first century.* We do 
not assume the truth of these writings, for that would be to 
take for granted the matter in dispute, but simply that they 
now exist, and that they can be traced back to the dates 
that have been mentioned. 

When we examine these compositions, we find that they 
are memoirs or biographies of a remarkable person called 
Jesus Christ, and that they represent him as possessing a 
character transcendently excellent and beautiful, faultlessly 
pure and perfect, unique and unparalleled in history. They 
do this, not by any formal description or delineation of his 
character — nothing of that kind is attempted — but by the 
simple record of what he said and did. Our limits forbid 
anything but a mere sketch of the character thus set 
before us ; and no such sketch can do it anything like 
justice. Indeed, no delineation or description can — nothing 
but the gospel narratives themselves. 

These memoirs introduce us to this remarkable })crson 

* Christlicb's " Modern Doubt and Christian Belief," p. 395. 



4: LIFE AND CHARACTER OF CHRIST. 

in his infancy. After intimation, by an angel, to his 
mother of his birth and of the name by which he should 
be called, he is miraculously conceived through the power 
of the Holy Ghost (such is the representation), and is born 
a " Holy Thing." He is born in a stable and laid in a man- 
ger, yet an angel from heaven announces his birth to men, 
and a multitude of the heavenly host praise God for his 
appearance in our world. And thus we meet at the very 
commencement of his earthly life that combination of great- 
ness and lowliness, dignity and abasement, which marks it 
throughout and distinguishes it from every other life. 

The child Jesus is not a prodigy, displaying superhuman 
wisdom and doing wonderful things from his very infancy. 
He is a perfectly natural and truly human child, but pure 
and holy, without any taint of evil or any stain of sin. He 
grows like other children, both physically and mentally, in 
stature and in intelligence. He attracts the affection of all 
who come in contact with him, and has favour with God, 
whose grace is upon him. 

This is the picture given us of his infancy. Of his boy- 
hood we have but a glimpse — one recorded incident, but 
it is in harmony with the childhood that has preceded. 
When twelve years of age, he goes up to Jerusalem with 
his parents, and is left behind there at their departure. 
When they return to seek him, they find him "in the 
temple, sitting in the midst of the doctors, both hearing 
them and asking them questions " — the impression made 
upon all who hear him being one of amazement " at 
his understanding and answers." There is nothing in his 
conduct or bearing to offend — no pertness nor forwardness, 
no want of modesty or humility ; yet he shows a measure of 
intelligence and an interest in Divine things so far beyond 
those of an ordinary and merely human youth, that those who 
hear him are " astonished." His mother gently reproaches 
him for having remained behind his father and herself with- 
out their knowledge, and thereby caused them anxiety on 
his account : and then we have that first recorded word of 
his — "Wist ye not that I must be about my Father's busi- 



HIS SPOTLESS CHILDHOOD. ' 5 

ness?" — the "solitary floweret plucked out of the enclosed 
garden of the thirty years," which shows us that he had 
come to know himself and his relation to the Father — a 
knowledge which surprised his mother, and which, not under- 
standing, she carried away to meditate on and ponder. 

Now it has been well shown by Bushnell that, whether 
fact or fiction, we have here the sketch of a perfect and 
sacred childhood — that, in this respect, the early character 
of Jesus is a picture that stands by itself — that in no other 
case has a biographer, in drawing a character, represented 
it as beginning with a spotless childhood. He adds — " If 
any writer, of almost any age, will undertake to describe 
not merely a spotless but a superhuman or celestial child- 
hood, not having the reality before him, he must be some- 
what more than human himself, if he does not pile together 
a mass of clumsy exaggerations, and draw and overdraw, 
till neither heaven nor earth can find any verisimilitude in 
the picture."* This is strikingly exhibited by the apocry- 
phal gospels in their portraiture of Christ's childhood. 
While the writers of the gospels we are considering say so 
little of the infancy and youth of Jesus, and expressly tell 
us that he did his first miracle at Cana of Galilee when 
entering upon his public ministry, the apocryphal gospels 
fill his childhood and youth with all manner of grotesque 
and absurd miracles and prodigies, showing us what it was 
in the power of that age to invent, and in what a contrast it 
stands to the naturalness and reserve of the canonical gospels. 

When we pass from Christ's childhood to his manhood, 
and consider his character as it is then presented to us, we 
find that it is just the development of his pure and spotless 
youth, to which it stands in the same relation as the flower 
does to the bud from which it has expanded. 

As we survey this character, the first thing that strikes us 
is its perfect innocence and sinlessness. According to the 
representation given of him in the gospels, Jesus Christ is a 
perfectly innocent and sinless being. During his whole life, 
he neither does wrong, nor gives just cause of offence to 
* " Nature and the Supernatural," p. 280. 



6 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF CHRIST. 

any one. He never injures any one, by word or deed. 
Many, no doubt, are offended with him, but it is with what 
is good in him that they are offended — with his faithfulness 
and truth, his purity and holiness, his compassion and 
benevolence. The Scribes and Pharisees are offended with 
his humility because it rebukes their pride, with his bene- 
volence because it reproves their selfishness, with his holi- 
ness because it contrasts so strongly with their moral turpi- 
tude and vileness. But this is their blame ; he is blameless. 
The idea of Christ, in this respect, conveyed by the gospel 
narrative, is that of a perfectly innocent and harmless being, 
one whose life is altogether inoffensive, and to whose heart 
every feeling of hatred and unkindness is a stranger. 
And, while thus innocent and harmless, he is so without 
sustaining any loss of dignity — without giving any idea of 
feebleness or weakness, such as we often associate with 
mere innocence — nay, while conveying the strongest im- 
pression of greatness and power. 

Nor is Christ innocent and harmless merely; he is sinless. 
This, we are aware, is denied by some ; but we contend that 
it is the representation of the gospel naj-rative. There is 
no act attributed to him that can, with any show of justice, 
be regarded as a sinful act. His driving of the traffickers 
out of the temple, especially when taken in connection with 
his claim as Son to rule in his Father's house, is an act 
not only compatible with sinlessness, but positively holy 
and even godlike in its character. And the fact that so 
many retire without resistance before a single man, implies 
a consciousness of wrong-doing upon their part, and shows 
the majesty of reproving holiness. As to the charge of 
injustice and unreasonable resentment, founded on his 
smiting a fig-tree with barrenness, it is almost unworthy of 
serious refutation. There was no injustice and no resent- 
ment in the case. It was a warning expressed in symbol, 
an admonition given by an act. It was Christ's taking an 
inanimate object — and, therefore, one that was incapable of 
suffering — and using it to reprove the people of Israel for 
their unfruitfulness, and warn them of impending doom. 



HIS SINLESSNESS. V 

Then we have most important testimony on this point 
borne by Christ's enemies. Pilate washes his hands before 
the multitude, in token of his freedom from all participation 
in the crime of putting an innocent man to death ; and says, 
" I am innocent of the blood of this just person." Judas, 
who knew what Christ was, not only in public but in private, 
so far from having anything to allege against him that 
might have excused him to himself and others for what he 
had done, testifies to his innocence, and says, " I have sinned 
in that I have betrayed the innocent blood." 

And what shall we say of Christ's own declarations 
respecting himself ? That he claims to be a perfectly sin- 
less being is undeniable. His challenge to his enemies is, 
"Which of you convinceth me of sin .''" Of his invulner- 
ability to the assaults of Satan, he declares, " The prince of 
this world cometh and hath nothing in me;" and of his 
obedience to the Father, he says, " I do always the things 
that please him." And not only does he make this claim ; 
he carries it through without faltering in its assertion, or 
abating it for a single moment. During his whole life 
he never makes a confession of sin, drops a tear of peni- 
tence, nor offers a prayer for forgiveness. He has no 
remorse, no regrets, no sense of having failed in any duty — 
no feeling that he should have done anything different, or 
in a different manner, from what he has done. " It is clear," 
as Dorner says, " in the most decided moments of his life, 
that he is conscious of no sin. That his self-consciousness 
was really of such a sort that his conscience never accused 
him of any fault or error, is the firmest and most indis- 
putable historical fact, explain it as we may. That he 
imposed upon himself as his life-task the salvation and 
reconciliation of the world ; that he was conscious, too, of 
being occupied with the solution of this problem, in suffer- 
ing even to the cross ; and that he died in the full 
consciousness of having solved the problem, as well as of 
unbroken communion with God, is just as undeniable as 
that it would have been an insane and absurd thought to 
wish to redeem and reconcile others, if he had been con- 



8 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF CHRIST. 

scious of needing redemption himself. How, then, can the 
phenomenon be explained, that he, to whom even sceptics do 
not deny the rarest measure of purity and clearness of mind, 
stands before us without being conscious of a single sin, or 
of the necessity of conversion and amendment, which he 
requires of all others ; if not in this way, that he was 
conscio2Ls of no sin because he was not a sinner." This is 
the only adequate explanation of it : for as Bushnell has 
well said, " If Jesus was a sinner, he was conscious of sin, 
as all sinners are, and therefore was a hypocrite in the 
whole fabric of his character ; realising so much of Divine 
beauty in it, maintaining the show of such unfaltering 
harmony and celestial grace, and doing all this with a mind 
confused and fouled by the ajfectatio7is acted for true 
virtues ! Such an example of successful hypocrisy would be 
itself the greatest miracle ever heard of in the world." 

No ; Christ lived in a world where he was exposed and 
tempted to evil, but the purity of his nature constantly 
repelled it. As he touched the leper, and no uncleanness 
followed, so he mingled with sinners and received no con- 
tamination from them. He had evil suggested to his mind 
by Satan, but his holy soul did not admit it. " He did no 
sin, neither was guile found in his mouth." He was " holy, 
harmless, undefiled, and separate from sinners." And in this 
sinlessness of Jesus, in the midst of a sinful world, we have 
something that separates him from all other men, in which 
he stands solitary and alone, the one sublime exception to 
a universal sinfulness. 

But not only is Christ free from all stain of sin ; he is 
distinguished by the highest positive moral excellence, even 
perfect love to God, and pure, disinterested, self-sacrificing 
love to man. This love is the groundwork of his character, 
its grand distinguishing peculiarity. He shows his love to 
God by a regard to His will in all things — a constant, cheer- 
ful, devoted obedience. At twelve years of age, as a matter 
not more of duty than of delight, he must be about his 
Father's business. As he fulfils his ministry, it is his meat, 
the joy and invigoration of his soul, to do the will of Him 



HIS LOVE TO MAN. 9 

that sent him, and to finish His work. And when his earthly 
life is closing, he contemplates it with satisfaction, because he 
can say to the Father — " I have glorified Thee on the earth ; 
I have finished the work which Thou gavest me to do." 

And what shall we say of his love to man, but that the 
world has never witnessed anything like it before or since. 
His whole life on earth was just the expression of that love 
• — the shedding of its light on the world's darkness, the 
pouring of its life-giving and healing waters on the world's 
barrenness and drought. This love showed itself in his 
tender sympathy with all human woe — with the deprivations 
of the blind, the heart-sorrows of the bereaved, the infatuation 
of the erring. How he pitied the widowed mother of Nain 
in her bereavement, the sisters of Bethany in their grief, 
his disciples when they sorrowed in the prospect of his 
departure, the inhabitants of Jerusalem in their sinful and 
infatuated rejection of himself! 

Nor was his an empty and barren sympathy, but one 
accompanied and made efficacious by an active benevolence. 
" He went about continually doing good, healing all man- 
ner of sickness and all manner of disease among the people." 
He declared that he " came not to be ministered unto, but 
to minister, and to give his life a ransom for many." And 
he fulfilled this, his own high ideal, at once of his mission 
and of true greatness. His whole life was one constant minis- 
try of self-sacrificing love. He ministered to man in his physi- 
cal and earthly wants, healing the sick, cleansing the lepers, 
opening the eyes of the blind, comforting the sorrowing, 
restoring the dead to life. And he ministered to man in 
spiritual wants. He did so by the gracious words that pro- 
ceeded out of his mouth, his words of compassion and 
tenderness and absolving love. He ministered thus to the 
paralytic, when he said, " Son, be of good cheer, thy sins are 
forgiven thee ;" to the woman who was a sinner, when he said, 
"Thy faith hath saved thee, go in peace;" and to the woman 
of Samaria, when he revealed himself to her as the Mes- 
siah, and gave her the true water of life. And the crowning 
act, the climax of this ministry of love, was when he 



10 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF CHRIST. 

ascended to Calvary, and there, by a voluntary death of 
agony and shame, gave his life a ransom for many. " Here- 
in, indeed, was love" — greater than ever man has shown. 

To the highest active benevolence Christ united the 
passive virtues. It has been justly remarked that, by 
his life and teaching, Christ has revolutionised the world's 
estimate of these as an element of greatness. Before 
his time, men associated greatness almost entirely with the 
heroic virtues, and regarded meekness under injury, patient 
endurance of wrong, forgiveness of enemies, as little more 
than weaknesses. But Christ, by his example, has taught 
the world not merely that true greatness is compatible 
with the passive virtues, but that they form an important 
element of it. He exhibited these not only in the 
greater trials of life, but also in what are said to be their 
severest test, its commoner and minor trials. During his 
life he was a man of sorrow^s and acquainted with grief 
He was so poor that he had no dwelling he could call 
his own. He knew what it was to hunger, to thirst, and to 
be weary. He was misunderstood by his friends, and mis- 
represented and maligned by his enemies. His good was 
evil spoken of, and his works attributed to Satan. His disci- 
ples clung tenaciously to their mistaken views of the Messiah, 
and were slow to believe all that the prophets had spoken, 
and all that he taught respecting his sufferings and death. 
His words were often w^atched for ground of accusation 
against him, and plots were formed against his life. But 
amid all this privation, misconception, and opposition, so 
fitted to discourage and provoke, he is never ruffled or 
chafed in spirit, never manifests fretfulness or impatience, 
displeasure or discontent, never complains or murmurs, but 
holds on his way with an unclouded serenity and a sublime 
and undisturbed composure. He is not insensible either to 
physical or mental ills. Exquisitely sensitive both in soul 
and body, he feels these acutely ; but in virtue of his per- 
fect unselfishness, his devotion to the Father, and his love 
to man, he rises above them and possesses his soul in a 
celestial patience. 



HIS MEEKNESS AND PATIENCE. 11 

When we view him in the closing scenes of his earthly 
life, in what is specially called his passion, he presents a 
spectacle of meek endurance of wrong, and of undeserved, 
yet patient and uncomplaining suffering, such as the world 
has never seen. None ever suffered as he did ; but, although 
innocent, he is an uncomplaining sufferer. He is silent in 
the hall of judgment when the mockery of a trial is con- 
ducted for his condemnation — silent when he is blindfolded 
and buffeted, spit on and scourged, ridiculed and crowned 
with thorns — silent when he toils with his cross along the 
road to Calvary, the only word that he utters being one 
not of self-lamentation, but of pitying regard for others, 
" Daughters of Jerusalem, weep not for me, but weep for 
yourselves, and for your children." Well might it be said 
of him, " He is brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as 
a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he openeth not his 
mouth." If, therefore, to suffer even to death uncomplain- 
ingly, being innocent, manifest greatness of soul, none ever 
exhibited such greatness as Jesus of Nazareth. 

Then think of his forgiveness of injury ! When Peter 
came to him on one occasion, and asked, " Lord, how oft 
shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him .'' till seven 
times ? " his reply was — " I say not unto thee until seven 
times, but until seventy times seven." And what he thus 
preached he practised. He forgave Peter for denying 
him, Thomas for doubting him, all the disciples for forsaking 
him at his apprehension. Nay, he forgave those who cruci- 
fied him. As they drive the nails into his hands, he raises 
his meek eyes to heaven and prays, " Father, forgive them ; 
for they know not what they do." No wonder that even 
Rousseau felt constrained to say that if Socrates suffered 
and died like a sage, Christ suffered and died like a god. 

And not only did Christ combine the different classes of 
virtues in his character ; he united in himself all the 
virtues. Unlike any other great man of whom we read — of 
whom the most that could be said was that he possessed 
one or more virtues in a high degree — Christ possessed every 
virtue in its perfection, so that it is not possible to name any 



12 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF CHRIST. 

moral excellence that did not belong to him. He possessed 
these virtues, moreover, in such just proportion, that his 
character was not only complete and full, but in perfect 
equipoise and balance, exquisitely s\Tnmetrical and har- 
monious. His love to God was in beautiful accord with his 
love to man. The one of these \'irtues did not outrun the 
other, or develop itself at its expense, but wrought har- 
moniouslv with it And what was true of these fundamental 
elements of character was true of the various virtues into 
which they resolved themselves. In him, love for the race 
co-existed with love for the indi\-idual. Shepherd of 
the whole family of man, he could leave the ninetj^-and- 
nine in the wilderness, and go after the one that was lost. 
With a world upon his hands, he could stand and call one 
bhnd man to him for heahng, converse with and lead to 
faith and repentance one erring woman by the well of 
Jacob, receive one anxious inquirer who comes to him by 
night, and make kno^\-n to him the way of eternal Ufe. 

The heroic and the gentle virtues met in him. To the 
highest manly virtue, the courage that could stand un- 
dauntedly against an opposing world, he joined " the 
highest characteristics of womanly \-irtue — infinite devotion 
and singleness of purpose, the unruffled serenity of a calm 
and gentle spirit, pure and modest feeling in the main- 
tenance of the finest moral distinctions, and the power 
peculiar to women of passive obedience — ^power to bear, to 
suffer, to forego in unspeakab'e loyalt}'."* 

Xever were contrasts so > . cd, and apparent contradic- 
tions so reconciled, as in him. He is grave without being 
gloomy, unworldly without being unsociable, self-denied with- 
out being austere, spiritual without being ascetic, intolerant of 
sin, while gentle and tenderly compassionate to the sinner. 
His dignity is wedded to humiUt>*, his zeal guided by \\'is- 
dom, his enthusiasm joined with calmness and self- 
possession. He is in harmony with himself, \\*ith nature, 
with dut}-, with ever\-thing but sin ; and he is so because 
he is in harmony with God — because the law of God is 
* Martensen's " Christian Ethics," p. 252. 



HARMONY OF HIS CHARACTER. 13 

within his heart, and he is filled and pervaded by love to 
him. And in virtue of this inner harmony he does all 
things well. He is never taken by surprise, nor at a loss 
what to do. He is never unprepared for the occasion, or 
unequal to the emergency, but always does the right thing, 
at the right time, and in the right manner. 

He is truly a perfect character, "fairer than the children 
of men." Whatever he may have been in bodily person, he is 
altogether matchless in the beauty of his character. His life 
is a picture, not only without a blot, but without a defective 
line. It is a majestic anthem, running through the whole 
scale of love and service, sounding every chord of thought 
and feeling, and rising to heaven without a discordant note. 

If we view Christ as a teacher, all admit that none ever 
taught as he does. He has not learned in the schools of the 
Rabbis, and yet he speaks with a wisdom which amazes those 
who hear him, and leads them to ask in wonder, " Whence 
knoweth this man letters, having never learned ? Whence 
hath this man this wisdom and these mighty works.-*" He 
has had no training as an orator, and yet from the first 
moment he opens his lips to teach, he shews himself to 
be a perfect master of human speech. 

His teaching is not after human methods, but after a 
manner of his own. He does not speculate, nor make 
guesses at truth. He does not reason and infer, build up 
and prove by elaborate process of argumentation or induc- 
tion. He announces rather, and reveals. He speaks that 
which he knows, and testifies that which he has seen. The 
truth lies before him — is within his mind and heart — and 
he simply utters it ; and it is seen and felt to be the truth 
by those who hear. 

His instructions are not imparted in an artificial and 
formal system, but in precepts and statements of truth, 
each of which has often a kind of completeness in itself, and 
which, as they fall from his lips, might be likened to the 
stars as they drop one after another into the evening sky 
and light up the heaven with glory. He teaches, moreover, 
not in the language of the schools, but in that of the com- 



14 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF CHRIST. 

mon people, so that all can understand ; and often in para- 
bles which are pictures of Divine truth, drawn from nature 
and ever}--day life, and which come home to all hearts, and 
hve in the memory for ever. 

When we consider the matter of his teachincr — confining: 
ourselves at present to his ethical system — we find it to be 
the highest and purest morality — a morality which even 
sceptics and unbelievers acknowledge to be the noblest and 
most perfect that has ever been propounded, and before 
which the world has bowed down for the last eighteen 
hundred years. It is to this effect — *' \\Tiatsoever ye would 
that men should do to you, do ye even so to them ;" ''Love 
your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them 
that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you 
and persecute you ; that ye may be the children of your 
Father which is in heaven : for he maketh His sun to rise on 
the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on 
the unjust. ... Be ye therefore perfect, even as your 
Father which is in heaven is perfect." 

And this teaching is with authority. He speaks not as 
if there was any doubt of the truth of what he says, but 
with the manner of one who is assured and certain, w^ho 
speaks what he knows, and who has a right to declare the 
laws of the kingdom. His teaching is after this manner — 
*' Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of 
heaven;" ''Ye have heard that it hath been said, An eye for 
an eye, and a tooth for a tooth : but I say unto you, That ye 
resist not evil ; " " Heaven and earth shall pass away, but 
my word shall not pass away;" "The word that I have 
spoken, the same shall judge him in the last day." Well 
might it be said, " Xever man spake like this man." And 
well might we ask, and leave the sceptic to reply — " \Mience 
hath this man this wisdom.'" 

Closely connected with Christ's teaching are his claims. 
When we examine these, we find them to be such as have 
never been advanced by any human being before or since. 
Time will permit us to do little more than mention some 
of these. 



HIS CLAIMS. 15 

First of all, then, he declares his humanity, and again 
and again calls himself " the Son of man." But by this 
designation, as applied to himself, he intimates not merely 
that he is a possessor of our nature, a member of the 
human family; but that he is something more than this — 
that he stands in a peculiar relation to the race — that he is 
the Son of man as no other is — the ideal, the representative 
man — the second man, the head of a new humanity — the 
*' Son of man" spoken of by Daniel, the destined possessor of 
universal kingdom and dominion. 

But while thus calling Himself the Son of man, he claims 
no less emphatically to be the Son of God. He calls God 
his Father. "All things are delivered unto me of my 
Father." "My Father worketh hitherto, and I work." 
When the High Priest adjures him, by the living God, to 
tell whether he be " the Christ, the Son of God," his un- 
hesitating and unequivocal reply is, "Thou hast said." And 
when he claims to be the Son of God, he claims to be so in 
a high and peculiar sense, a sense in which no mere creature 
can aspire to the title, and which implies the possession of 
the same nature with God. This is clear from the distinc- 
tion which he always makes, in speaking to the disciples, 
between t/ieir relation to God and /as. He never places 
Himself on a level with them in this respect — never says of 
God 02ir Father, but mj/ Father and yot^r Father. The 
opening words of the Lord's prayer are no exception to 
this ; for he is there teaching the disciples to pray, and 
does not include himself His language is, "After this 
manner pray ye." 

In accordance with this lofty claim he speaks of himself 
as being " from above," having " come from God," having 
"come out from the Father." He places himself on a level 
with the Father, as when he says of the Jews, " They have 
both seen and hated both me and my Father," when he com- 
missions the disciples to baptize in the name of the Father 
and of the Son and of the Ploly Ghost ; and when speaking 
of the Father and himself, he says, "We will come unto 
him and make our abode with him." He claims co-ordi- 



16 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF CHRIST. 

• 

nate authority with the Father — '^ My Father worketh 
hitherto, and I work." And when the Jews take up stones 
to stone him because he called God his Father, and 
thereby, in their view, made himself equal with God, he 
says nothing to intimate that they were wrong in the in- 
ference they had drawn from the claim which he advanced. 
He declares himself "Lord of the Sabbath;" asserts his 
power to forgive sins and to enact the laws of the kingdom ; 
claims to be honoured equally with the Father ; declares 
that the dead shall hear his voice and come forth to life — 
that, as the appointed judge of all, he will come in glory 
and judge all nations — and that men will be accepted or 
rejected according as they have shown love and attachment 
to him as represented by his people, or have disregarded 
and neglected him. He proclaims himself to be " the light 
of the world," " the way, the truth, and the life," by whom 
alone any one can come to the Father — the only one who 
knows the Father, and can make him known to men. He 
invites all who labour and are heav}^-laden to come to him 
that he may giwQ them rest — bids all men follow him, and 
forsake everything that they may do so — declares that he 
will draw all men to him. He demands the highest affec- 
tion of the human heart, and avers that whosever loveth 
father or mother more than him is not worthy of him, and 
cannot be his disciple. 

Such are some of the claims of Christ. Every one will 
admit that they are the most wonderful ever made by any 
being. If any man, any merely human teacher, even though 
he were a prophet or an apostle, were to make such claims, 
would he not cover himself with ridicule, and excite either 
the world's pity of his fanaticism, or its indignant scorn of his 
unfounded and arrogant imposture .'* Imagine any man, even 
one " charged with a special, express, and unique commis- 
sion from God to lead mankind to faith and virtue,"* stand- 
ing forth, and saying, " All power is given unto me in heaven 
and in earth," " I and the Father are one," " He that hath 
seen me hath seen the Father" — holding out hands to a 
■^ J. S. Mill's " Essays on Religion," p. 255. 



CHRISTIANITY GUARDS LIFE AS SACRED. 17 

unprofitable members ; and they therefore concluded that 
the painless destruction of infant life, and especially of those 
infants who were so deformed or diseased that their lives, if 
prolonged, would probably have been a burden to them- 
selves, was on the whole a benefit. . . Minute and 
scrupulous care for human life and human virtue 
in the humblest forms, in the slave, the gladiator, the 
savage, or the infant, was, indeed, wholly foreign to the 
genius of Paganism. It was produced by the Christian 
doctrine of the inestimable value of each immortal soul. 
It is the distinguishing characteristic of every society into 
which the spirit of Christianity has passed."* 

Suicide cannot on the ethical principles of sensationalism 
be condemned as a crime. When life becomes a weariness, 
when it is felt that the pain outweighs the pleasure of 
living, shall we condemn the act of the man who seeks 
quietude in death ? The teaching of the elder Mill was 
sadly carried to its legitimate conclusion by one of his sons, 
who, learning from his physician that his disease was mortal, 
shot himself to avoid a lingering death.t 

The doctrine of the dependence of sociology on biology, j 
in other words, the dependence of a right theory of social 
life on correct knowledge of the laws of organic life, affords 
ample field for conjecture as to the ways in which utilit- 
arianism might apply Darwin's law of the " nidefinite modi- 
fiability"§ of the human species by natural selection. A 
State free from the " theological bias," and in the hands of 
philosophic legislators, would offer a tempting field for 
experiment in the direction of a higher development of 
organism and intelligence, by careful scientific oversight 
of the question of population. Utilitarian ethics would 
facilitate this great enterprise by abolishing the Christian 
sentiment which protects the purity of the family and 

* " History of European Morals," Vol. ii., p. 27. 
t M'Cosh's " Scottish Philosophy," p. 378 ; c/. also Leck/s " European 
Morals," pp. 40-63. 
X Spencer's " Sociology," chap. xiv. 
§ Spencer's " Sociology," p. 329. 
li 



18 DOCTRINE OF AN IMPERSONAL GOD. 

guards the sanctity of home. Plato, the most elevated 
of all non-Christian thinkers, gives in his " Republic" a 
curious example of speculation on this subject* James 
Mill suggests, rather than avows, very peculiar views in his 
^'Political Economy." -|- John Stuart Mill, who has done 
more than any other man of this century to lead edu- 
cated young men into senationalism in philosophy and 
utilitarianism in morals, has with great candour professed 
opinions which cannot be other than shocking to every 
Christian. In referring to this matter, I must crave the 
indulgence of my audience, if it be such as I should rather 
bury in oblivion than expose to your scorn ; but an illustra- 
tion of the sort indicates to Christian parents better than 
argument the direction in which atheistic morals would guide 
their sons and daughters. Mill tells us that for twenty 
years he was the devoted friend of a talented lady, whose 
affections he won, though her husband, whom he describes 
as " a most upright, brave, and honourable man," was still 
living. He was in the habit of visiting her and travelling 
with her in the absence of her husband. He takes care to 
inform us, however, that they gave not the slightest ground 
for any other supposition than the true one, that their rela- 
tion to each other at that time was one of " strong affec- 
tion and confidential intimacy only." For, he adds, 
" though we did not consider the ordinances of society binding 
on a siLbject so ejitirely personal^ we did feel bound that our 
conduct should be such as in no degree to bring discredit 
on her husband, nor, therefore, on herself" | The words 
of Jesus Christ plainly and emphatically exhibit the 
character of such a relationship. I would have you note, 
especially, the tone of morality suggested in Mill's quietly 
avowed belief in the lawfulness of conduct which the rudest 
and least informed member of a Christian community will 
instinctively condemn. Yet the leader of the school of so- 
called progress in morals was carrying out consistently the 

* See Grote's " Plato," Vol. III., p. 202. 
t " Political Economy," chap, i., § 2. 
X " Autobiography," p. 229. 



CHRIST THE ALONE PERFECT EXAMPLE. 19 

principles of his ethical creed. It was not his moral code, 
but the healthy instincts of Christian society, that saved 
him from abominable crime. 

6. If society should cast oft belief in God, and remove 
from contemplation the example of Jesus Christ, it would 
be impossible to discover any moral type towards which 
life might be ever approximating, by which the conflict- 
ing motives and emotions might be justly regulated, and 
after which the whole man might be formed in " the beauty 
of holiness." The golden, the heroic age has ever been 
placed in a far distant past ; while philosophic dreams of 
perfection have been localised in cloud-land. 

It may indeed be argued, as Mill has argued, that the 
" benefit, whatever it amounts to," of the precepts of Christ 
" has been gained. Mankind have entered into the posses- 
sion of it. It has become the property of humanity, and 
cannot now be lost by anything short of a return to 
primeval barbarism."* The doctrine of Christ may be 
rejected, His Divine mission denied. His obedience of the 
Father accounted a delusion. His sacrifice denounced as 
a theological fiction. His resurrection derided as a fanatical 
dream ; but the " benefit, whatever it amounts to," of His 
morality, remains a part of the inheritance of mankind. 
Let us suppose the Gospels read by one who is fully con- 
vinced that Jesus Christ was not a Divine Saviour, but a 
sell-deceived enthusiast, at first simple-minded and sincere, 
then gradually deteriorating into a fanatic, deceiving as well 
as deceived — how much of influence, think you, would His 
precepts, however beautiful, retain ? Take away from the 
life of the Son of man the power that is derived from our 
belief in him as the Son of God, let there be removed from 
our thoughts all sense of the world unseen, from which He 
came and to which He returned, and the Perfect Man will 
have little power to fix our hearts upon His example, and 
mould us into His likeness. The Christ of the atheist 
cannot be the Healer and Guide of mankind. 

The example of Jesus Christ would be wholly out of 
* " Essays on Relijjion," p. 98. 



20 DOCTRINE OF AN IMPERSONAL GOD. 

place in the morality of evolution. The evolutionist must 
reject Him as but ill-suited to illustrate a wise adaptation of 
the sensitive organism to its environment. His life does 
not furnish a good type of skilful adjustment of " constitu- 
tion to conditions." " He was a man of sorrows, and 
acquainted with grief;" by no means the pattern of a 
morality whose foundation-principle is pleasure. 

Utilitarianism of the older sensational school is equally at 
fault, when it passes outside the Church of Christ, and 
searches among men uninfluenced by religious motives for a 
life which youth might regard with admiration and follow 
with enthusiasm. It searches in vain.* It is throw^n back 
from example to doctrine, and its doctrine, mechanical and 
not vital, is without reforming and renovating power. The 
scorpions of legislative enactment, following the whips of 
an education resolutely directed to the formation in each 
person's mind of " an indissoluble association between his 
own happiness and the good of the whole," "f" might do much 
to make members of the community submit to the utilitarian 
yoke, in so far as concerns property and the administration 
of justice ; but Benthamism has no power to subdue the 
anarchic passions of the soul, to eradicate vice out of the 
heart, to clothe society " with the garments of salvation," 
and cover it with the " robe of righteousness." 

Mill himself acknowledges that, " although educated in- 
tellect enlightening the selfish feelings is prodigiously im- 
portant as a means of improvement in the hands of those 
who are themselves impelled by nobler principles of action," 
not one of the " survivors of the Benthamites or utilitarians 
of that day now relies mainly upon it for the general 
amendment of conduct." J In old age he reached on this 
point a well-founded mistrust of the favourite opinions of 
his youth. For a morality framed out of materials derived 

■^ Cy! on " Our Lord's Character," " Some Elements of Religion," 
by Canon Liddon. The testimony quoted by him from Goldwin 
Smith is especially worthy of attention. 

t Mill's " Utilitarianism," p. 25. 

:j: " Autobiography," p. in. 



PANTHEISM THE NEGATION OF SIN. 21 

wholly from the senses — which has no reward but this life's 
pleasure, and no dread but earthly pain — which is enclosed 
wholly within the organism and its affections (whether the 
individual organism or the collective organism, called 
society), can have no power to regenerate or elevate man- 
kind. It cannot, even when supported by the powerful aid 
of education, renovate the heart within. Clough, who drifted 
from his early faith into cheerless naturalism, gives us the 
sum of this new revelation when he says : — 

" It seems His newer will 
We should not think of Him at all, but turn, 
And of that world which He hath given us, make 
What best we may." 

But we can make nothing of it if we cease to " think of 
Him at all," if we turn from the True Light, and with 
the shadow on our faces look only towards this, in the 
judgment of Mill, immoral and cruel world.* Know 
God is the first maxim in moral progress ; Know thyself, the 
second. But neither is possible, save in that mediation in 
which God is revealed to man, and man is made known to 
himself In the life and death of Jesus Christ the complete 
ethical ideal is realised. Here is perfectly exemplified 
righteousness without defect, holiness without taint ; mercy 
clasping the hand of vileness, yet receiving no stain ; love, 
which is the fulfilling of the whole law ; calm assertion of 
authority in the face of power, the supremacy of the eternal 
life, the marvellous spiritual alchemy by which the very 
pangs of the earthly lot are transmuted into pleasures of 
the soul. Nor, truly, has this holy Redeemer lived and died 
in vain. His Gospel has been gradually revealing its power, 
awaking humanity from the bestial sleep of sin to a sense 
of the nobler aim of goodness. This work of healing will, 
by God's grace, go on till the ethical idea shall be a second 
time realised in " the new man, which after God is created 
in righteousness and true holiness." -|- 

7. The negation of a personal God, the Creator and 

* Essay on Nature, in " Essays on Religion." 
t Ephcsians iv. 24. 



22 DOCTRINE OF AN IMPERSONAL GOD. 

Ruler of all things, annuls the doctrine of sin, and breaks 
down all distinction between moral good and evil. 

Pantheism identifies the soul with the One as a pheno- 
menal manifestation of it ; the pantheist cannot, then, 
condemn any act as essentially evil. The One is as truly 
revealed in the murderer as in the philanthropist. There 
can be no wrong in wrong-doing, if right and wrong are 
alike the unfolding of the same existence, if they rise out of 
and sink again into that One Mysterious Life. 

Nor is our argument on this point less effective when it is 
directed against the evolution hypothesis. For if the whole 
man be a product of evolution, the evil in him is as really a 
product as the good. His temper and disposition are the 
necessary outgrowth of his inheritance and his surroundings. 
Sin is no longer sin. Immorality is an essential factor in the 
evolution of humanity, and is no more worthy to be con- 
demned as involving guilt or responsibility than is the for- 
mation of the lips or the colour of the hair. Nature evolves 
the serpent as well as the dove. That the serpent has a 
poisonous fang is not a fault, but a virtue. Its destructive 
venom has aided the cobra in the struggle for existence. 
The brutal Nero and the benevolent Howard have been 
alike evolved by the necessary laws of nature. It is un- 
reasonable, then, to praise or blame. No man can be called 
a sinner. Each person is what he is as a part of the 
irresistible movement of the cosmos. The molecular 
activities which constitute thought and emotion and con- 
science and will are the physically certain outgrowth of the 
primeval nebula.* 

* Professor Huxley, in his address at the recent meeting of the 
British Association, cited the gi-eat masters in Calvinistic theology as 
witnesses on behalf of his doctrine that sensation and intellection are 
automatic. But the certainty which is involved in Calvinism is Uto 
caelo different from the necessity of physical development. Calvinism 
deals with the acts of rational moral beings having the causes of their 
voluntary acts in se, in their own intellectual and moral nature ; evolu- 
tion makes all voluntary action to be the necessary result of physical 
causes operating as a part of the material cosmos. How far the 
exercises of reason and conscience may be fore-ordained is a question 



NATURE AS A GUIDE OF CONDUCT. 2 



o 



The scepticism of John Stuart Mill on the question of reli- 
gion will not provide a door of escape out of this difficulty. 
In his posthumous "Essays," we have a most repulsive picture 
of the cosmos. He finds in its constitution and operations 
all manner of vice and crime ; to follow nature, he maintains, 
would be to arrive at the consummation of villany. But if 
there be no God, or, what is the same thing, if there be no 
proof which makes it reasonable to believe that there is a 
God, and if there be no hereafter, whence comes the light 
to show us that crime is crime, and to commit crime is 
criminal ? The murderer or the thief may defend himself 
on the ground that nature, his only guide, sets him a wicked 
example, if his deeds be wicked, and encourages him in his 
evil course, if it be evil. Nature as it is constituted, he may, 
on the authority of Mill, allege, lies and cheats, violates 
every principle of honest dealing, subjects its victims to 
torture, commits wholesale murder, prompts to every 
manner of wickedness by internal motives and external 
enticements.* Above nature, he may add, there is no God, 
and beyond the' present, no immortality; what right, then, 
has the moralist to set up an artificial rule of conduct, 
and enforce what nature has not enjoined ? It may be 
easy for a philosopher, who has been under intellectual drill 
from infancy, and who has found his world not in real 
life, but in thought, to control himself and conform to 
a non-natural standard of morals ; but the great majority 
of people are not philosophers. They are certain that they 
have bodies, and are furnished with many reasons to make 
them look upon it as very doubtful whether they have souls. 
Morality is, then, altogether a question of taste ; and the 
classical canon has never been repealed : de giistibiis non dis- 
putandiLin. As nature has distributed to every man, so let 

insoluble by philosophy, and belonging properly to revelation. Such 
fore-ordination, however, stands related only by way of contrast to the 
fatalistic predestination of physical necessity. The necessity of mate- 
rialism renders moral action impossible. If all volition be the necessary 
result of physical causes, then clearly whatever is is right. Stains on 
the character are no more blameworthy than spots on the sun. 
* Mill's " Essays on Religion," pp. 28-36. 



24 DOCTRINE OF AN IMPERSONAL GOD. 

him enjoy its bounties. He presumes too far who demands 
a pretence of virtue beyond the rule of nature. The indi- 
vidual may well rest self-satisfied if his morals reach the 
standard of the universe. 

8. To remove from human thought belief in a personal 
God, and to fix before consciousness a kingdom of natural 
law in His stead, tends to weaken and impair our moral 
faculty. The effect of this — which I may call the distinctively 
scientific — habit of mind is to repress the higher indivi- 
dual energies — the energies dependent on the will, and to 
produce a quietism favourable to the supremacy of the 
passions in the individual, and to the domination of evil in 
society. The ceaseless consciousness of law, and that not 
as the ordinance of a higher intelligence addressed to man 
for his direction, but as the fatalistic order of a universe 
without a God, must weaken our sense of power, making us 
less inclined to " envisage circumstance," and assert the 
supremacy of mind. Now one of the most valuable 
elements in a high moral nature is that consciousness of 
inner strength. It may sometimes run into stoic pride, or 
be soured into cynic contempt, or be perverted into 
impudent self-assertion, but without it there is no high and 
noble spirit. Christianity on this point, as on many others, 
mediates between two contraries : it at once bows the soul 
to the lowest depths in self-abasement, and lifts it to the 
highest pitch of conscious strength. Such sense of power 
has always shown itself in what we might call the heroic 
periods of Christian struggle. We have a notable instance 
in English Puritanism, whose masculine faith crushed with 
strong hand and resolute will the proud nobility of 
England. 

9. A godless morality can supply no motive power within 
the breast adequate to sustain man's ardour in the pursuit 
of goodness. 

" No heart is pure that is not passionate ; no virtue safe 
that is not enthusiastic."* But how can utility or pleasure- 
seeking kindle this purifying flame of holy ardour, or feed 

* " Ecce Homo," p. 8. 



CHRIST THE IMPULSE TO VIRTUE. 25 

this glowing enthusiasm ? It can furnish no such " impulse 
to virtue." It may theorise about devotion to humanity ; 
it cannot create such an emotion, much less nourish it with 
life-long sustenance. It has, indeed, been argued* that, as 
among the Greeks and Romans a passionate love of country 
inspired the most heroic deeds, so the love of mankind 
might become the source of ennobling inspiration. But it 
is forgotten that patriotism has only produced one kind of 
virtue — the virtue of soldierly fidelity and fortitude. The 
Spartan died for Sparta, the Roman died for Rome ; for to 
each his country was a camp, and the citizen a soldier. 
But love of country did not impart to Spartan or to Roman 
the power needful to wrestle against sin and conquer the 
enemy within himself Expand the idea of citizenship so 
as to embrace mankind, and what hope is there that this 
dim generality will enkindle warmth enough to maintain 
the motive force needed to carry the soul through all the 
impediments it must encounter in an incessant effort after 
goodness .-* How different is the persuasive power of 
Christ ! How far-reaching and penetrating are His words, 
how effectual His ethical lessons ! His Gospel addresses 
itself to every right motive principle by which man is ani- 
mated, and fills each with Divine vigour. It appeals to our 
filial affection, " Be ye followers of God as dear children ;" 
it wields over us the mighty power of love, " As Christ also 
hath loved us ;" it binds us by the strong cords of gratitude, 
"And hath given Himself for us ;" it inspires by the example 
of self-sacrifice, " An offering and a sacrifice to God for a 
sweet-smelling savour." By such powerful influences it 
removes out of the heart the two cardinal lusts — im- 
purity and greed. " But fornication, and all uncleanness, or 
covetousness, let it not be once named among you, as be- 
cometh saints."*!* That these springs of moral vigour may 
flow perennially, it identifies our life with the sacrificial 
death of the Redeemer in every exercise of the faith in 
which we find salvation ; " I am crucified with Christ : 

* Mill's " Essays on Religion," p. 107. 
t Ephcsians v. 1-3. 



26 DOCTRINE OF AX IMPERSONAL GOD. 

nevertheless I live ; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me : and 
the life which I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith of 
the Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself for me."* 

Here is the inexhaustible source of passionate personal 
devotedness, which can do and bear all things. 

10. The philosophy of ev^olution is equally impotent to 
set before the mind an end or final motive adequate to sus- 
tain an elevated moral purpose. Indeed, one of the funda- 
mental principles of this philosophy is to discard altogether 
the doctrine of final causes. But let us for the moment 
suppose it to be sufficiently inconsequent to cast about 
among the conceptions proper to it for a final end in life, 
what aim will it set before us ? the individual perfection ? 
The growth of knowledge makes this end more and more 
evidently unattainable ; and even though it were, we 
have the dismal prospect that when the mind shall have 
perfected itself in knowledge and in skill, the cunning 
instrument must be broken, the wondrous rythmic corre- 
lations of molecular change must be resolved, and the brain, 
with its priceless treasures, perish. Shall we aim at the 
perfection of the race ? What part can any of us have in 
that far-off future ? Why toil in pain after results which 
may or may not be achieved, and which, if such blessedness 
be in store for man, cannot be enjoyed by him for ages after 
we shall have become part of the earth's dust ? 

Evolution throws no gleam of sunshine on the future ; 
the sweet rose of hope will not bloom when budded on that 
stock. Atheistic philosophy has had always gnawing at its 
heart the secret consciousness that the world can never on 
its principles be made the home of a blessed race. If 
atheism ever enjoyed an hour of hopefulness, it was that 
brief day of its triumph in France at the outbreak of the 
Revolution — a day which had scarce dawned when it was 
overcast with blood-tinted clouds and closed in fearful 
darkness. 

Pessimism, half-muttered or openly avowed, has ever 
been the creed of scepticism and infidelity. David Hume 

* Gal. ii. 20. 



. ATHEISM LEADS TO PESSIMISM. 27 

has left on record a curious picture of his mental unrest, in 
which one may trace how the new wine of his youthful en- 
thusiasm became acidified into scepticism.* John Stuart 
Mill has given an elaborate account of a very similar 
experience. " It occurred to me," he writes, " to put the 
question directly to myself : ' Suppose that all your objects 
in life were realised ; that all the changes in institutions 
and opinions which you are looking forward to could be 
completely effected at this very instant : would this be a 
great joy and happiness to you r And an irrepressible 
self-consciousness distinctly answered, * No.' At this my 
heart sank within me : the whole foundation on which my 
life was constructed fell down. All my happiness was to 
have been found in the continual pursuit of this end. The 
end had ceased to charm, and how could there ever again 
be any interest in the means ? I seemed to have nothing 
left to live for."-|- The state of feeling in which he con- 
tinued for a considerable time, he afterwards saw exactly 
pourtrayed in the lines of Coleridge — 

" A grief without a pang, void, dark, and drear — 
A drowsy, stifled, unimpassioned grief. 
Which finds no natural outlet or relief 
In word, or sigh, or tear." 

In his posthumous " Essay on Nature," he gives a dismal 
picture of this world as it left the hands of its Creator — if, 
indeed, it had a Creator. Herbert Spencer argues out the 
conclusion that the sidereal system — including, of course, all 
life and thought — must in time be reduced again to the 
nebulous form out of which it has been evolved ; and he 
predicts for it successive integrations and disintegrations 
running on through an endless series. | Germany, formerly 
the nurse of transcendental idealism, has adopted pessimism 
as her favourite philosophy. The cynic Schopenhauer has 
become the master of German speculative thought through 
the popular exposition of his gloomy creed by his disciple 

* Dr. M'Cosh's "Scottish Philosophy," p. 115. 
t " Autobiography," pp. 132-149. 
X " First Principles," p. 480. 



28 



DOCTRINE OF AN IMPERSONAL GOD. 



Hartmann. M. Albert Reville, a competent authority, 
affirms pessimism to be the only philosophy now accepted 
by German opinion. To exhibit the depressing gloom of 
this final word of atheistic speculation, I shall quote a few 
sentences from M. Reville's article.* 

" There is nothing real and constant but pain. All 
pleasure is negative, a diminution or temporary cessation 
of pain, but never a positive condition of happiness. All 
life is essentially suffering ; and as human life exhibits the 
most intense degree of willingness to live, it is natural that it 
should be the richest in sufferings. Our world is of 
necessity the worst of possible worlds." 

" The world is bad ; life is an evil ; the only salvation is to 
be found in nothingness." 

Hartmann treats with not unmerited scorn the shallow 
hope that humanity may be made more blessed through 
the progress of science, and the application of its discoveries 
to convenience and comfort. 

" The world moves on, in spite of — or rather by virtue of 
— its progress in knowledge and in power, towards a future 
sadder than its past. The working classes are better 
educated, better housed, better fed, and more unhappy 
than before. Immorality may become more refined ; it is 
always the same, and bears the same poisonous fruits. Genius 
in science, as in art, will become more rare. A dead-level 
will become fixed in this domain, as in others ; and the toil 
will exceed the pleasure of knowledge. Earth is already in 
the afternoon of its planetary day ; it moves sorrowfully 
towards the twilight of the evening. Aged humanity will 
have no successors ; it will finally relinquish the vain pursuit 
of happiness, and will only sigh for insensibility, nothingness, 
the 7iirvdna. If the reader find this result distressing, he 
must learn that he has been mistaken if he has believed 
that he could find in philosophy consolations and hopes. 
There is but one hope that is not forbidden him — if, at 
least, he arrive at making the aim of the unconscious a 

* "Un Nouveau Syst^me de Philosophic Allemande;" "Revue des 
Deux Mondes," i^"^ Octobre, 1874. 



THE HOPEFULNESS OF CHRISTIANITY. 29 

conscious aim for himself — that is to say, if he abandon 
fully his personality to the logical development of the world. 
He will rejoice himself by anticipation in the vision of that 
end which will be the suppression of all individual and 
collective life, and which will accomplish, by the return to 
not-being, the grand redemption, the universal and final 
emancipation into the bosom of the eternal silence." 

The materialist may say. This is a disordered dream ; it is 
not our teaching ; we repudiate such conclusions. But, I 
reply, it is demonstrable that if you eliminate from your 
creed the doctrine of a personal God, the just and good 
Governor of all things, this pessimism is a more consistent 
conclusion than your talk of progress and improvement. 
Your great master himself, Herbert Spencer, carries evolu- 
tion, as we have seen, to its necessary issue in the annihilation 
of all collective and individual life. Hartmann, whatever 
the historical succession of his philosophy, is undoubtedly 
a materialist. He holds firmly by the doctrine of philo- 
sophic unitarianism, or monisme ; he resolves matter into 
force ; he builds up his physical system on the atomic 
theory ; he makes the brain the sine qua non of thought. 
The materialist school has no right to disown him. He 
holds the fundamental principles of their creed ; but, with 
the profound and fearless logic of Germany, he drives the 
materialistic doctrine to its necessary ethical conclusions. 
Having rid the universe of God, he finds it to be, instead of 
a paradise, a hell ; and he can discover no hope of happiness 
or rest but in the annihilation of conscious being. 

Need I remind you who have been preserved in the faith 
of Jesus Christ, how different is the light which Christianity 
sheds around us on this world t Earth is not, indeed, a 
paradise ; deep are the shadows resting on it ; dark the 
stains on the conscience of man ; keen the pangs which 
pierce his heart in the necessary discipline of suffering ; 
" the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together 
until now ;"* but enclosing, embracing all are the heavens 
filled with divine glory, ever bright with the clear light of 

■^ Romans viii. 22. 



30 DOCTRINE OF AX IMPERSONAL GOD 

righteousness, and shedding in upon our cold hearts the 
kindly warmth of a Father's love. The Gospel is a message 
of hope to man — of hope to the individual and to the race. 
It is not for finite intelligence to unravel the mystery of 
God's giving or withholding ; but we have abundant proof 
that the redemption of Christ is powerful to regenerate the 
most degraded, and quicken into moral health the vilest 
life. A\'e are 

" Emboldened to prefer 

"^'ocal thanksgivings to the eternal King, 

\Mi05e love, whose counsel, whose commands have made 

Your ver\- poorest rich in peace of thought 

And in good works ; and him who is endowed 

With scantiest knowledge, master of all truth. 

Which the salvation of his soul requires." 

Xo dungeon of despair can imprison the soul that 
hearkens to the Redeemer's voice. It is a fact of human ex- 
perience, authenticated by an induction based on countless 
instances, that the Great High Priest is " able to save them 
to the uttermost that come unto God by Him ;"* and that 
in a salvation which waits not to bear fruit in the eternal 
world, but is evidenced to be a real and vital healing by 
the most convincing proofs in this. The disciples of Jesus 
Christ are warranted in preaching the Gospel of the king- 
dom, and in offering up the petition, " Thy kingdom come," 
with unfaltering faith. 

But even though the future of humanit}' should prove 
darker than we believe ; though the mysterious hand that 
governs all the ages should permit the sin of human souls 
to rise like a thick cloud and cast a shadow over the last 
days ; still, for each Christian there is a final aim, on which 
if he fix his heart, he will find it lift him into a constant 
hopefulness, and sustain him under all the burdens he may 
have to bear. The siivnmnn bomim of the believer is God 
Himself ; it is, as we have been taught in childhood, " to 
glorify God, and to enjoy Him for ever." In this " chief 
end" the lines of faith and of philosophy converge and are 
lost in the light ineffable : for here is the supreme of self- 

* Hebrews vii. 25. 



DESTRUCTIVE OF RELIGION. 31 

annihilation, and therefore, the annihilation of all pain ; 
here at the same time is the perfecting of individual and 
self-conscious being, and, therefore, the perfection of enjoy- 
ment. 

Materialism, weaned with its doubts, its toils, its suffer- 
ings, its despair, turns sadly away from this world's 
wretchedness, and wrapping itself in the cerements of the 
grave, sighs for death : Christianity, her face wet with tears 
shed over the sin and misery of man, yet trustful, ardent, 
enthusiastic, stretches in hope towards an unbounded future, 
with the exultant exclamation on her lips — Life, life, 
eternal life ! 

The effects on religion of the doctrine against which my 
argument has been directed, need not long detain us. To 
remove from our minds the idea of a Divine Personality is 
to destroy religion. For if God be an impersonal Some- 
thing, separated from us by the vast aeons of evolution, 
faith is impossible. We might believe that Infinite Power 
exists ; we could not in any real sense trust in it. Love is 
extinguished ; we have no capacity for loving an inscrut- 
able and unknowable It. Hope must die ; we have nothing 
either to expect or dread, since the decay of the cerebrum 
brings everlasting unconsciousness. Prayer is an absurdity ; 
to address petitions to an unknown Something would be 
ridiculous : can this Something hear ? and if it can, the law 
of evolution sweeping on in pitiless night would render it 
impotent to aid us. The voice of praise is silenced : our 
psalms are but silly rhapsody — the music of foolish words, 
such as a moon-struck poet might address to the unheeding 
stars. Bereft of faith, and love, and hope, and prayer, and 
praise, what is left of religion ? Who would care to keep 
the earthen vessel from which the precious ointment has 
been poured out, and which has been so effectually cleansed 
by the acids of philosophy, that there clings to it not a 
trace of the old perfume to recall the ineffable sweetness 
that has perished .'* 



MIRACLES AND PROPHECY: 



/ 

REV. A. C. MURPHY, M.A. 






MIRACLES AND PROPHECY. 



♦•» 



THE Bible is a grand fact, and a prime factor in the 
moulding of the modern world. It claims to be a 
revelation from God, and an account of the way of man's 
salvation. It contains a record of miracles performed and 
prophecies accomplished in attestation of that claim. The 
historical structure of the book permits of the easy authen- 
tication of these two forms of evidence. Our object is to 
show that the performance of miracle and the accomplish- 
ment of prophecy afford a full and sufficient vindication of 
the claim of the Bible to be the Word of God and the 
Gospel of salvation. 

I. — The Miracle. 

What, let us first inquire, is a miracle ? There is an 
orderly course of nature going on around us, resulting from 
the action of countless forces which work according to their 
own established laws. Let an event occur, then, which 
cannot be accounted for by the forthputting of any force 
or group of forces in the existing system of things, and 
which requires for itself the supposition of some power 
superior to every force or group of forces in the existing 
system, and we call that event a miracle. And as God 
alone can put forth a power superior to every force in the 
existing system, so every miracle is the immediate work of 
God. 

So much for the nature of the miracle ; but what about 
the fact ? Is there any such thing as a miracle at all ? Is 
it not, after all, but the phantom of an inflamed imagination .•* 
Must it not be held that nothing can happen which is not 
in accordance with the established laws of nature ? There 



4 MIRACLES AND PROPHECY. 

are those who strenuously maintain this doctrine, and who 
appeal to the universal experience of men in evidence of 
its truth. Wliere is the man, they ask, who has ever seen 
a miracle ? They make bold to say that no amount of 
evidence in favour of a miracle could counterbalance the 
antecedent unlikelihood of the thingr itself — that it is easier 
to believe in the untrustworthiness of the most intelligent, 
honest, and unanimous testimony, than in the actual occur- 
rence of that supernatural event on behalf of which the 
testimony is brought forward. 

Now, in opposition to this doctrine, let me lay down the 
three following propositions : — (i.) That the existence of 
God implies the possibility of the miracle ; (2.) That God's 
moral government of the world implies the probability of 
the miracle ; (3.) That God's redemptive interference on 
behalf of the world implies the necessit}- of the miracle. 

1. — TJie existence of a personal God implies the possibility 
of the miracle. God can do according to His will with the 
world which He has made. If the countless forces which 
are at work in the world have been forged upon the anvil 
of the Divine purpose, and if, by their manifold play and 
counterplay, they produce the existing constitution of 
nature, it is obvious that the Creator of these forces can 
supplement them or arrest them in whatever way may be 
pleasing in His sight. 

Let me seek to illustrate the point before us by a sort of 
slidinsr scale of instances. 

Suppose a world in which gravitation is the only force at 
work — a world the separate particles of which exert no 
more complex influence upon each other than the heavenly 
bodies do in their widely-divided revolutions through the 
sky — a world for which a rough resemblance may be found 
in the aspect of some desolate sea beach, or some huge 
heap of debris lying at the mouth of a mine. Introduce 
now into this world of atoms, loosely thrown together, the 
force of cJiemical attraction. A remarkable agitation imme- 
diately ensues. The old places and relations of things are 
thoroughly disturbed by the play of the new powers. 



THE MIRACLE. 5 

Whatever is peculiar to chemical force stamps its distinctive 
character on the whole system. The old solitude and 
desolation is broken up into wild insurrection and revolt. 
A great natural leaven works within the mighty mass, and 
the dark and formless void cakes into solid land and 
cleaves into seas, ferments into mountains and steams into 
atmosphere, breaks into light and bursts into thunder. 

Introduce, again, into the world we are supposing, the 
fresh element of vital force. Let the organific principle 
lay hold upon the gravitating and chemically-propertied 
elements, and dissolve and blend and compact them 
according to its own distinctive forms. The world forth- 
with receives a new character and aspect Forests clothe 
the hills ; grasses grow along the brooks ; ferns creep out 
into the air in moist and shady places ; mosses wrap them- 
selves round the stones ; seaweeds flap to and fro with 
the swaying waves against the bases of the headlands ; not 
the coming and going oi the white snow only, but the 
coming and going oi the green foliage also, serves now for 
a distinction between the wintry and the summery world. 
And these organific forces tell mechanically, as well as 
chemically, upon earth and water and atmosphere. They 
act in the capacity of natural ploughshares and aqueducts 
and ventilators. Results follow, therefore, in the realm of 
organic life, which could not have been possible under the 
reign of naked chemistry, just as results followed in the 
chemical sphere which could not have been possible under 
the reign of naked gravitation. 

Introduce, in the next place, into the world we are 
imagining the element of anhnal instinct Let beings 
endowed with sense and impulse, and the power of move- 
ment from place to place in response to some instigation 
from within, be set at large upon its surface. Thereupon 
nature is invested with a new character and aspect. As 
gravitating force was grappled with and moulded to ends 
outside of itself by chemical force, and as these two forces 
in turn were grappled with and moulded to ends outside 
of themselves by organic force, so all these successive forms 



6 MIRACLES AND PROPHECY. 

of force are grappled with and moulded to fresh ends by 
the force of sentient and self-impelling life. 

Introduce once more into the world before our thought 
the element of human reason. Let beings endowed with 
intelligence and conscience and freewill make a place for 
themselves in the pre-existing system of things. Straight- 
way the world assumes a new character and aspect, in 
correspondence with the new infusion of force. Perception, 
foresight, self-restraint, calculation of the use and value of 
existing forces, employment of these for the production 
of fresh effects, the pictorial power and constructive power 
of the imagination, the faculty of distinguishing between 
true and false, right and wrong, beautiful and ugly, bene- 
ficial and harmful, transient and permanent — a group of 
powers such as these, placed under the control of a single 
will, must necessarily effect a marvellous transformation 
upon the face of nature. The existing life, whether sentient 
or non-sentient, becomes but the handmaid of this higher 
life that has broken into the midst of it. Forests are cleared ; 
mountains are mapped off into sheep-walks or shooting- 
grounds; valleys are cultivated; oceans are navigated; rivers 
are spanned with bridges, swept with dredging-machines, 
strained through fishing-nets; lands are honeycombed with 
mines and tunnels, and scored witli roads and railways 
and telegraphic systems. The new force of free intellectual 
and moral life, playing in among the pre-existing system 
of forces, checks or extends, neutralises or amplifies the 
action of these in ways that were otherwise unprovided for 
and impossible. 

Let me then make one more supposition. Introduce into 
the world under view the play of some superior power, pro- 
ducing results which transcend the operation of the whole 
catalogue of forces already enumerated, from that of gravi- 
tation up to that of the human will, and those results are 
what we call miraculous. He who called into existence, 
whether successively or in one grand moment of originating 
power, the gravitating force, the chemical force, the vital 
force of the vegetable, the sentient and instinctive force of 



1 



THE MIRACLE. 7 

the animal, the intellect, conscience, and will of the man, 
can carry on His interfering agency to any extent, either 
by the introduction of still higher intelligences and energies, 
or by the forthputting of His own undelegated might among 
the complicated system of existing things. There is no 
region within the range of the universe at which it could 
be reasonably said to the advancing tide of the Divine 
omnipotence, " Hitherto shalt thou come, but no further ; 
and here shall thy proud waves be stayed." There can be 
no partition wall between the power of God and any 
imaginable amount of Divine intervention, except the saving 
clause of some Divine promise of non-intervention. But 
who can quote any such saving clause ? Who can point to 
any charter in which the King of kings renounces His pre- 
rogative of playing in among the powers of nature in 
whatever ways and for whatever purposes may please Him ? 
The very existence of a personal God implies the possi- 
bility of the miracle. 

The dogma of the absolute immutability of the laws of 
nature, with its two corollaries of the correlation of forces 
and the conservation of energy, is the favourite watchword 
of the physical science of the day. It is true that the laws 
of nature, when left to their characteristic play, as they 
virtually are, by Him who has established them, are im- 
mutable. And it is true that the men of science have 
shown the validity of the doctrines of the correlation of 
forces and the conservation of energy in certain important 
spheres of physical research. But the allegation that the 
laws of nature are not subject to the government of God, 
or that their action cannot be to any extent interrupted 
or added to by Him, is an unscientific assumption. What 
God begins He can equally augment, or interrupt, or end. 
What God establishes He can disestablish,, whether with 
or without compensation for the loss sustained by the 
surviving system of things. To affirm the absolute im- 
mutability of any laws except those moral and spiritual 
laws which are the very transcript and exposition of the 
character of God, and for the unchangeablcness of wliich 



8 MIRACLES AND PROPHECY. 

we have at once His own pledged word and the deepest 
intuitions of our nature, is to rob Him of His royal pre- 
rogative, and depose Him from the throne of the universe. 
God has not made the laws of nature independent of Him- 
self. He does not abrogate His eternal power and Godhead 
on their behalf Only on the ground that God is nature 
and nature God — that is, on the ground that there is no 
God at all — can we affirm the absolute immutability of the 
laws of nature, and deny the possibility of a miracle. 

II. — God's moral government of the world implies the 
probability of the miracle. It may be urged that, though a 
miracle is not beyond the sweep of the Divine omnipotence, 
it is inconsistent with the idea of the Divine wisdom. 
While the possibility of it is not challenged, its propriety, 
its conformity to any good purpose, its compatibility with 
a system of things emanating from a Being of perfect 
prescience and perfect might, is called in question. The 
laws of nature, if not absolutely immutable, it is urged, 
must be morally immutable, as being the expression of the 
will of Him who is without variableness or shadow of 
turning. 

This criticism may be most effectually dealt with by 
being counter-criticised. 

1. In the first place, then, there is a fallacy involved in 
the statement that the laws of nature are the expression 
of the will of God. The laws of nature, as we employ the 
phrase, are not the expression of the will of God ; they are 
only our own account of the way in which the will of God 
expresses itself They are, in the last resort, but human 
generalisations. They are the ex cathedra utterances of a 
mind that at its best is not infallible. They are the ultimate 
deliverances of a never-exhaustive analysis of natural pheno- 
mena. There is a chasm, which can never be crossed from 
the human side, between the counsel of the Creator and the 
works and workings of His hands. 

2. In the next place, it is illegitimate to argue from the 
unchangeableness of the Divine mind to the unchangeable- 
ness of the attitude and action of that mind. Unchange- 



THE MIRACLE. 9 

ableness of mind is one thing ; unchangeableness of 
attitude and action is altogether another thing. It may be 
the very unchangeableness of a man's mind which is the 
cause of the incessant variation of the modes in which he 
gives expression to his mind. A general enters the field of 
battle with the unchangeable purpose of gaining the victory. 
Yet on that very ground he changes his tactics with every 
new vicissitude in the events of the day ; and it is by the 
promptitude, variety, and soundness of his successive evolu- 
tions that he drives back the enemy, and bears away the 
palm of triumph. A shipmaster puts to sea with the 
unchangeable purpose of weathering the storm and gaining 
the haven. Yet on the very ground of the fixity of his 
purpose he flings forth orders, hot and frequent, to the 
mariners with every fresh change in the relations of ship 
and atmosphere and ocean ; and it is by the variety and 
promptitude and timeliness of these particular forthflashings 
of his will that he snatches his craft out of the white teeth 
of the tumbling billows, and carves for himself an avenue 
through the tangled wilderness of wind and wave, and 
reaches the port in peace. 

Now what holds good of man holds good of God, if we 
superadd these three considerations — (i.) That God foresees 
and pre-arranges from the beginning every change of 
attitude and action to which He may see good to resort in 
the course of the world's history ; (2.) That whenever the 
power of God is put forth afresh among the forces of nature, 
it is not to supplement the imperfection, but to secure the 
perfection of His work; and (3.) That God infallibly accom- 
plishes everything at which He aims. 

And the combined force of these three considerations is 
amply sufficient to establish the probability of the miracle 
as an engine in the moral government of the world. For 
consider the motive of the miracle. The miracle is for 
man, and for man alone. There must be a man to 
behold, as well as a God to do, in order that there may 
be a miracle. Now it is obvious that moral impressions 
could be produced upon the mind of man by direct inter- 



10 



MIRACLES AND PROPHECY. 



ventions of Divine power, which could not be produced by 
an everlastingly unbroken routine of natural laws and 
processes. These interventions, for one thing, would tend 
to withdraw man from the danger of offering that homage 
to nature which is due to God. A world so constructed 
that the example and expectation of supernatural power 
were totally excluded could scarcely escape becoming 
hopelessly godless and immoral. The miracle, rightly 
interpreted, is like the tender tone of the voice and touch 
of the finger by which friend endears himself to friend. It 
tells us God is near. It teaches us, by rare and transient 
glimpses of His glory, that His glory is always hovering 
around. It is the flash of His eye bent full upon us for one 
brief moment to bespeak the perpetual remembrance of His 
presence and His sympathy. 

We conclude, therefore, that the moral government of 
the world by God establishes the antecedent likelihood of 
the miracle. Granted that God retains any connection with 
and superintendence over the world He has created — 
granted that God has left Himself as free to deal with the 
forces of nature as He has left man free to deal with these 
— granted that God is disposed in any measure to control 
and educate the intellectual and moral nature of the 
crowning work of His hands — granted that He is in anywise 
sympathetic with the need and responsive to the faith of 
His creature — granted that man is to have any assurance 
or aspiration beyond the barrier lines of time and sense — 
granted that there is an unseen and eternal world casting 
its great shadow athwart the world that is seen and 
temporal, and that across the chasm dividing those two 
worlds there is to be any interchange whatever of thought 
or influence, and the probability of miraculous intervention 
is established. 

III. — God's redemptive interference on behalf of a fallen 
world implies the necessity of the miracle. The circum- 
stance that the human family has involved itself in the coils 
of sin beyond all power of self-extrication opens up the 
solemn question — Will God interfere or not to provide for 



THE MIRACLE. 11 

man that way of escape from ruin and doom which the 
laws of his own being and the laws of surrounding nature 
alike refuse to provide ? To answer that question in the 
affirmative is to assert the necessity of the miracle. For 
any such interference must be, by the very nature of the 
case, miraculous. It- must include superhuman appeals to 
the human understanding, and superhuman appliances to 
the human heart. For salvation, according to the only 
religious system that declares the necessity and unfolds the 
method of a redemptive interference — I mean that ex- 
pounded in the Bible — involves two principal results, a 
change of state and a change of nature — a change of state, 
consisting in the forgiveness of sin and reconciliation with 
God ; and a change of nature, consisting in the sanctifica- 
tion of the soul, and its assimilation to the image of God. 
God therefore must manifest Himself in some supernatural 
way to the soul which He would save by a plan of forgive- 
ness and reconciliation, and by a method of sanctification 
and moral ennoblement. Jesus Christ is this supernatural 
manifestation of God. We pass over the long series of 
Divine manifestations by which God maintained faith and 
hope and piety in the family of man in the interval between 
the fall and the Advent ; and we fix our eyes upon the 
Birth, Life, Death, and Resurrection of the Son of God as the 
grand miraculous epoch in the spiritual history of the 
world. To this all that went before points forward, and to 
this all that came after points back. Mark what takes 
place. A man miraculously born appears upon the scene. 
He is immaculate by the miracle of His birth. In Him is 
Divine everlasting life, derived from the Divine everlasting 
Fountainhead. He invites all who will to join and follow 
Him, and promises them deliverance. Those who accept 
His invitation are by their faith made mystically one with 
Him. As it fares with Him, therefore, so shall it fare with 
them. And how, then, does it fare with Him and them.? 
This man of God's right hand, though " holy, harmless, un- 
defiled, and separate from sinners," lays down His life, as if 
He were a sinner, paying the penalty of his sin ; and all who 



12 



MIRACLES AND PROPHECY. 



are mystically one with Him lay down their lives along with 
Him, This man of God's right hand takes up his life again, 
because it is Divine everlasting life ; and all who are 
mystically one with Him take up their lives along with 
Him. The Divine expedient, then, is briefly this — that the 
transgressor pays his penalty in the death of the Divine 
man, and in the resurrection of the Divine man receives 
everlasting life. 

The Advent of the Son of God in the form and nature of 
man is, therefore, the grand miracle of all time. And in the 
Advent in turn there are two miraculous occurrences which 
infold in themselves all that go before or follow after — 
His Incarnation, or the act by which He entered into our 
earthly life ; and His Resurrection, or the act by which He 
passed away from it. I do not say that the supernatural 
does not run along the whole course of His life, from the 
cradle to the cross. I do not say that the mysterious 
moment in which each penitent and contrite heart is joined 
to Jesus Christ, by faith in His person and w^ork, is not the 
occasion of a direct interposition of Divine power. What I 
do say is that the two conspicuous forthputtings of Divine 
power, round which the whole supernatural system involved 
in redemption circulates, are the Incarnation and Resurrec- 
tion of the Redeemer. 

As to the chain of minor miracles which signalised the 
life of Christ and His apostles, all that has been already 
said as to the bearing of the miracles upon the moral 
government of the world comes into play. No one was 
witness of the Incarnation. No one was witness of the 
Resurrection. Only a few hundreds were permitted to 
behold the form of the risen Lord. But it was necessary 
that a whole world should sooner or later become con- 
vinced that Jesus of Nazareth was the Christ, the Son of 
the living God. Herein we find an ample justification of 
the chain of minor miracles recorded in the Gospels and 
the Acts of the Apostles. The evidential force of a con- 
secutive series of supernatural works, countless in number, 
infinitely varied in character, situation, and surrounding 



THE MIRACLE. 13 

> 
circumstance, performed not only by the Master in His own 

person, but also in His name by those to whom He had 

entrusted the splendid prerogative, was irresistible in the 

minds of the first followers of the cross, and sufficient to 

inspire them with an enthusiasm of personal conviction and 

missionary zeal, such as should render the employment of 

the miracle largely, if not entirely, unnecessary in all the 

subsequent campaigns of the Christian Church. 

As to the character of the minor miracles, they are in 
strict accordance with the remedial system of which they 
are the proofs. Otherwise, indeed, they would be disproofs 
instead of proofs. They are all, virtually without exception, 
in the form of rescues, reliefs, restorations. They furnish 
a standing symbol and exposition in the material sphere of 
what the Saviour was prepared to do in the spiritual sphere. 
Their office was subsidiary, not principal. They were but 
physical means pointing towards spiritual ends. They 
were thrown down into the field of sense as the humble, 
though wonderful, endorsement of that Divine truth by 
which the world was to be redeemed. They were the grand 
Amen of the God of nature to the glorious proposals of the 
God of grace. They pointed with patient and undeviating 
finger to the doctrine of the cross. They were flashing 
chains flung round the neck of the new truth, compelling 
men to examine and admire the figure that bore so fair an 
ornament ; but let the new truth once take its proper place, 
and make its proper mark, in the mind of the world, and all 
that brilliant jewellery may be laid aside as needless and 
embarrassing. 

Let me endeavour to illustrate the principles laid down 
in a somewhat abstract form in the course of the preceding 
discussion, by a brief analysis of two memorable incidents 
in the life of Christ — the miracle of the marriage feast, and 
the three water miracles on the lake of Gennesaret. 

Of the miracle of the inariHage feast it is recorded by 
the Evangelist : — " This beginning of miracles did Jesus in 
Cana of Galilee, and manifested forth His glory ; and 
His disciples believed on Him." We learn from this signifi- 



14 MIRACLES AND PROPHECY. 

cant statement that there is a twofold effect of the miracle 
in the Christian system, a personal and a propagandist : 
it shows forth the glory of the worker, and it calls forth 
the faith of the beholder. 

The first effect is to show forth the glory of the worker. 
And the worker is always God. He who does a miracle in 
His own name proves that He is Divine. He who does a 
miracle in the name of Christ proves that Christ is Divine. 
He who does a miracle in the name of God proves that he is 
a messenger and representative of God. The disciples did 
every deed of superhuman might in the name of the Lord 
Jesus Christ. If, again, the Lord Jesus Christ did deeds of 
superhuman might indifferently in His own or in His 
Father's name, it was because He and His Father were 
one. A miracle is always a w^ork of God ; it is a fresh 
forthputting of Divine power, through whatever agency it 
may be wrought ; it is therefore a manifestation of the 
glory of the Most High. The statement that Christ, by 
the miracle of Cana, manifested forth His glory, implies 
that the Divine might which already resided in Him now 
for the first time burst into view. His glory He had with 
the Father before the world was ; but from this point 
forward, coruscations of the glory were to be flashed forth 
incessantly in the Divine deeds He was about to perform in 
the field of sense in attestation of His mission. Before 
this "beginning of miracles" the assembled guests regarded 
Him as no more than an ordinary man. There was nothing 
in His conversation or deportment that materially dis- 
tinguished Him from the vast miscellaneous human family 
to which He belonged. He spoke wise words, no doubt, 
with soft and winning voice; and the kindly deeds which 
it was His custom to do found a faithful reflex in His 
benignant countenance. But any other man might have 
been all that He appeared to be, so far as the bridal com- 
pany could judge. The glory was for so far hidden from 
their view. It had found as yet no exit in speech or deed, 
in glance of the eye or gesture of the body. But now His 
hour is come. He bids the firkins be filled with water. 



THE MIRACLE. 15 

That done, He bids the fluid be drawn forth and borne to 
the governor of the feast And lo ! the fluid that went in 
water — colourless, odourless, tasteless water — comes out 
wine. How the transformation was effected, it is bootless 
to inquire. Numberless incursions may be made into the 
outskirts of the mystery ; but the heart of the mystery, like 
the heart of the mystery of matter, or the heart of the 
mystery of life, or the heart of the mystery of the human 
spirit, remains a sacred shrine, unviolated by footfall or voice 
of man, possessed by the lone and awful glory of God. 
How the transubstantiation was brought about, the wedding 
guests could not imagine ; of one thing only they were 
assured that a Divine power had been put forth to effect 
the astonishing result, and put forth by Him who bade the 
waterpots be filled. Through the tones and gestures of 
that wonderful man, as through windows in the walls of an 
illuminated temple, streamed forth upon every eye the un- 
speakable glory of God. 

Accordingly, the second effect of the miracle is to call 
forth the faith of the beholden " His disciples believed on 
Him." He was invested with an entirely new character in 
their eyes. Although the moment after the miracle He was 
the same in appearance and speech as the moment 
before, yet by that intervening event a dividing line has 
been withdrawn, enabling them to gaze into inexhaustible 
depths of excellency in the person of the Man of Nazareth. 
He that has done this single supernatural thing, they reflect, 
must be equally able to do a thousand supernatural things. 
Supreme wisdom and power and goodness must be His 
native prerogative. In a word. He must be Divine. 

Thus the miracle has performed its twofold function : 
it has opened the eyes of the pious-minded to the personal 
glory of Emmanuel ; it has demonstrated His Divineness 
by a momentary work of wonder, that His disciples might 
evermore remember Him to be Divine, although in the 
prosecution of His vicarious work He should need to submit 
to all the wearinesses of our frail flesh, wound up by the 
crowning ignominy of death. " He must be one," they will 



16 MIRACLES AND PROPHECY. 

ever afterwards be able to say, " who has entered the world 
by some grand portal of His own — one who, in some mys- 
terious region of His nature, is a stranger to human gene- 
alogies and inheritances — one who is allied by some ineffable 
bond to the eternal King — one who, in ail that is deepest in 
His being, is to be classified with God, and not with man." 
Such must have been the spontaneous testimony of any spec- 
tator of the miracles which Christ did, whose intelligence and 
conscience had not been hopelessly distorted by the power 
of sin-born prejudice. The exclamation of Nicodemus puts 
in the most moderate and cautious form the conviction 
which all proper apprehension of Christ's mighty w^orks was 
fitted to create : — " Rabbi, w^e know that Thou art a teacher 
come from God : for no man can do these miracles that 
Thou doest, except God be w^ith him." 

The other incident in the life of our Lord to which I 
desire to allude is the triple water miracle on the sea of 
Galilee. I choose this illustration as suggesting an analysis 
of the physics as well as the ethics of the miracle. " In the 
fourth watch of the night," when the disciples had battled 
long with wind and wave, "Jesus went unto them, walking 
on the sea." To Peter He gave power, in proportion to his 
faith, to use the waves in the same lordly way as He Him- 
self was doing. As to the crew in general. He made the 
moment of His entrance into the ship the moment also of 
the stilling of the storm. 

A word or two on each of these miraculous results. 

Christ works the first miracle upon His own person. The 
swift -running waves are framed into a firm causeway 
beneath His feet; and he stands erect upon the tide as upon 
an undulating pavement. There are only two other analo- 
gous miracles wrought by Christ upon His own person — 
the Transfiguration, and the Ascension, including that chain 
of mysterious visits and vanishings which led up to the final 
act of the Ascension. The miracle before us may be said 
to be a stepping-stone to that of the Transfiguration, as that 
of the Transfiguration is to that of the Ascension. In the 
first case His body treads the water, in the next the air, and 



THE MIRACLE. 17 

in the last the infinitely attenuated ether that fills all 
space. 

Was the miraculous result then due, in the present 
instance, to an etherealisation of the body of our Lord, by 
means of which it pressed upon the water with no more 
weight than a column of superincumbent air.'* Or was it 
due to a consolidation of the water underneath, by which 
the pavemented wave presented a firm resistance to His 
feeti* It is not necessary to suppose any change in the sub- 
stance or in the properties either of the body above or of 
the water beneath. The force of gravitation acts as reso- 
lutely as ever. The inherent tendency of that material 
frame to sink through the bruised billows is as strong as 
ever. And why then does not the sinking follow ? Is it not 
enough to suppose that a force, sufficient to neutralise the 
downward force of gravitation in the body of our Lord, 
was exerted in the upward and opposite direction by the 
immediate power of God ? Whether nature was paid back 
in some other quarter for the fresh infusion of force in this 
quarter, is a question which is most wisely left in the hands 
of the Most Wise. Scientists, in the dreadful picture they 
are prone to draw of the consequences of a single hitch in 
the machinery, or lurch in the movement, of the physical 
system of things, make no proper allowance for the elasticity 
and self-adjusting power of nature. It is not likely that 
God's will, playing in among the physical forces of the 
world, will work more mischief or confusion than man's will 
would. Yet nature is not put out of countenance by man's 
ingenuity and energy, even when these are directed to the 
most perverse ends. There is nothing difficult, then, in the 
idea that a drawing up by invisible hands above, or a 
holding up by invisible hands below, whether attended or 
unattended by some equivalent compensation to nature for 
the local and temporary check upon her processes, may 
sufficiently account for the miracle of walking on the waves. 

Pass now to the next miracle. Our Lord put forth on 
Peter's body in the second instance the power which in the 
first instance He had put forth upon His own. But here a 



18 MIRACLES AND PROPHECY. 

new element comes into play. The power put forth upon 
His own person infallibly secured the end in view, but that 
put forth on Peter's was expressly made contingent on the 
faith of Peter. Peter had said, " Lord, if it be Thou, bid 
me come unto Thee on the water." And He said, " Come." 
That "come" carried with it the necessary support, on 
condition of the necessary faith. Let Peter but believe 
that this is the very Lord Himself, and that He is prepared 
to sustain him upon the sapphire pavement of the wave, 
and the disciple will walk as well as his Master on the sea. 
But let Peter lose faith in that mysterious Being that stands 
upon the lake in his near neighbourhood, and the nexus 
between his spirit and the spirit of Christ is so far sundered, 
and the sustaining strength withdrawn, and the unem- 
barrassed powers of nature return to their inexorable work. 
Christ could have, kept the man from sinking, apart from 
his own Avill, if He had chosen. But He did not choose to 
do so. He meant that the hazardous experiment should 
be a trial of his faith. Jesus never idly played with the 
laws of nature. He never interfered with the action of any 
physical force except for some spiritual end. He meant 
that Peter and all the crew should gain a lesson in faith 
which they should never lose. Peter then adventured into 
the deep, relying on the word of the Lord ; but, distracted 
by the terror of the storm, he lost sight of his Refuge and 
Strength ; and, losing sight of his Refuge and Strength, he 
began to sink, and sinking, he was forced violently back- 
ward into his fast-vanishing faith in Christ, and cried, 
" Lord, save me ; I perish ; " and so crying, he was caught 
up by that watchful hand, and lifted into the ship. 

Let us glance next at the third miracle in the group. 
"When they were come into the ship, the wind ceased." 
There is no violation of the laws of nature in this, any more 
than in the other instances. Every force acts in its accus- 
tomed way. When a storm rages, certain natural causes 
are at work producing the result. When those causes are 
withdrawn from the field, nature returns to its more 
tranquil and equable course, and the storm becomes a calm. 



THE MIRACLE. 19 

The causes do not cease to be causes ; they do not cease to be 
operating causes ; they have only disappeared from the field. 
They may have resolved themselves into other forms of 
force, or they may have been transferred in their original 
form to some new geographical area. But is there not a 
third event that might befall them, besides being resolved 
into other forms, or transferred to other regions .'' May 
they not be more or less suddenly met in mid-career by 
other forces equal and opposite to them, freshly launched 
from the hand of God ? In that case, the very same effect 
will be produced in the world of sense as if they were trans- 
formed in quality or transferred in situation. The Divine 
Hand does not by such a course infringe in the least degree 
upon the laws of nature, but only substitutes a supernatural 
counteractive force, at the time required, for the natural 
counteractive force that would otherwise follow at some 
later time. Determine the point at which, and the manner 
in which, and the extent to which one force works upon 
another ; and, I ask, cannot the Divine finger, by a sublime 
substitution, be applied at the point in question in the very 
same manner and degree ? A group of forces are at work 
in the atmosphere above Gennesaret, producing the bois- 
terous wind. God meets those forces with counter-forces 
that interrupt their action, and there is a calm in the 
atmosphere. But the sea still rocks and surges underneath. 
God meets the forces that are at work in the water with 
counter-forces that arrest their action, and there is calm 
upon the deep. 

But mark here also the spiritual end which our Saviour 
had in view. It is unfolded in the conduct of the crew. 
They that were in the ship came and worshipped Him, 
saying, " Of a truth, Thou art the Son of God." They had 
seen Christ walking on the wave, and that had so power- 
fully affected them that they exclaimed in terror, " It is a 
spirit." They had seen Peter stumblingly imitating Christ, 
and that must have added to their wonder and awe. But 
when the roaring hurricane is hushed, and summer wavelets 
gently lap the sides of the weather-beaten craft, and the 



20 



MIRACLES AND PROPHECY. 



smooth pebbles and brown bands of seaweed are seen 
through the crystal waters of the lake, they are filled with 
conviction, and say enthusiastically, " Of a truth, Thou art 
the Son of God ! " In order to draw that acknowledgment 
forth — in order to burn the belief that lay behind it deep 
into the hearts of the disciples — Christ completed the 
splendid chain of miracles of that night upon the waters, 
by the lulling of wind and wave to rest. 

The miracles of the Gospels, then, viewed in the light of 
incidents such as these, are seen to be at once benefits, 
symbols, and evidences. First, and most simply, they are 
be7tefits, or fruits of the Divine compassion. In the next 
place, they are symbols, accomplishing in the material 
sphere, and on the mortal bodies of men, what Christ was 
prepared to accomplish in the spiritual sphere, and on their 
immortal souls. Finally, they are evidences, proving, by 
irresistible inference, first, the claim of the miracle-worker 
to be "a teacher come from God ;" and second, the truth 
of what He teaches. To those who complain that the 
miracle is not continued still in the Christian Church for 
the fixing and strengthening of human faith, it is enough 
to answer that we have all that made the miracle valuable 
and efficacious. We have the Bible, the miraculous heir- 
loom of the old inspiration. We have the Sabbath-day, the 
standing record of the miracle of the Resurrection. We 
have Baptism and the Lord's Supper, sacred projections 
along the centuries of the Christian era of two grand 
epochs in the miraculous life of Christ. But, above all, we 
have Jesus Christ Himself Christ, in His person and 
character, is indeed the great world-miracle, about which 
all the minor miracles play Hke scintillations round a 
central fire, associated with which their reasonableness is 
morally demonstrated, divorced from which they melt into 
unmeaningness. With Jesus Christ, born and risen, they 
stand and fall, even as with Him stand and fall also all 
human faith and hope and piety and peace. 



THE PROPHECY. 21 



11. — The Prophecy. 



" The Lord thy God will raise up unto thee a Prophet 
from the midst of thee, of thy brethren, like unto me ; unto 
Him ye shall hearken." Such are the words with which 
Moses, in the midst of his great farewell discourse, en- 
courages the children of Israel. And the children of Israel, 
all along the line of their subsequent history, regarded these 
words as an authoritative promise of Messiah ; and to the 
hope which that promise inspired they clung with a terrible 
tenacity through their darkest days of corruption and 
captivity. It was a sort of spiritual star, leading them on 
by many winding ways to the manger of Bethlehem. In 
the light of that high hope the mother-love of Israel went 
forth in deep, mysterious yearnings towards the cradle of 
Emmanuel. 

Long before Moses had given a characteristic shape to 
the great world-hope, indeed, it had exercised its fascinating 
sway over the minds of men. Adam himself had caught 
hold of it in the form of the " seed of the woman," bruised, 
but victorious. Noah had caught hold of it when God 
made with him and with his seed " an everlasting- covenant." 
Abraham had caught hold of it, when God guaranteed to 
the childless old man that in him and in his seed, neverthe- 
less, should "all families of the earth be blessed." And 
Abraham passed on the hope to Isaac, and Isaac to Jacob, 
and Jacob to the fathers of the twelve tribes. And now, 
in turn, Moses comes forward to record that hope ; and 
with all the mingled authority and pathos with which last 
words are invested, he speaks of a Prophet, like unto him- 
self, unto whom the people should be constrained to 
hearken. 

And when Christ came at last, we find all classes of His 
contemporaries coming forward to endorse the truth of 
that interpretation which the piety and hope of so many 
centuries had put upon the words of Moses. " Philip 
findcth Nathanael," in the exciting days of our Lord's first 
public introduction to the world, " and saith unto him. We 



22 MIRACLES AND PROPHECY. 

have found Him, of whom Moses in the law, and the prophets, 
did write." On the occasion of the banquetting of the five 
thousand on the green-sward of Grennesaret, the people 
cried out, under the stimulus of that stupendous miracle, 
" This is of a truth that Prophet that should come into the 
world." After the Master had passed away, Peter stood 
forth in Solomon's porch, and preached of Jesus Christ, 
" Moses truly said unto the fathers, A prophet shall the 
Lord your God raise up unto you of your brethren, like 
unto me ; Him shall ye hear in all things whatsoever He 
shall say unto you." Stephen, uplifting upon his murderers 
a face like the face of an angel, made application of IMoses* 
words to the man of Nazareth, " This is that Moses, which 
said unto the children of Israel, A prophet shall the Lord 
your God raise up unto you of your brethren, like unto 
me ; Him shall ye hear." Nay, before either of these 
had learned the language of the cross, Moses himself 
had come mysteriously forward in company with Elias, 
in that Transfiguration scene for the account of which 
we are probably indebted to Peter himself, and spoken 
of His "decease, wiiich He should accomplish at Jeru- 
salem." 

It is unquestionable, then, that the Prophet, whose advent 
was announced by Moses, was understood to be none other 
than IMessiah Himself It will be of importance, therefore, 
to show that the words, "a prophet like unto me," were appro- 
priate in the mouth of IMoses in a way in which they could 
not have been appropriate in the mouth of any other man. 
It is recorded in the concluding chapter of the book of 
Deuteronomy, by way of epitaph upon the mighty dead, that 
<' there arose not a prophet since in Israel like unto Moses, 
whom the Lord knew face to face." Moses, in his standing 
in the kingdom of God, and most probably in his personal 
character too, is the sublimest figure on the stage of human 
history, He alone being excepted whose shoe-latchet the 
great lawgiver, in common with the humblest child of God, 
was unworthy to unloose. Let me proceed briefly to show- 
that he was not only a prophet, but the prophet of prophets; 



THE PROPHECY. 23 

that there was no prophet like him among men ; and that, 
in a deep and real sense, he alone among men was like that 
greater Prophet who was to come. , 

What, then, is a prophet .'* A pro-phet is one who bears a 
message from God to man. It matters not whether the 
message refers to the past, the present, or the future ; if it be 
a burden brought down from the Most High, the bearer of 
the burden is a prophet It is not the nature of the 
announcement, but the source of the announcement, that 
brackets it under the head of prophecy. 

All revelation then, it appears, is of the nature of pro- 
phecy ; and all men who have taken part in revelation belong 
to the class of prophets. We cannot attempt to enumerate 
the men whom God has raised up from the beginning of 
time, to be the depositarians and expounders of His mes- 
sages to men. If the "goodly fellowship of the prophets" 
could be gathered together out of all lands and ages, many 
a strange figure would rise up by the side of Moses and 
Isaiah and John the Baptist ; many a new name would 
become familiar in men's mouths ; many a fresh character 
would be furnished for the reverent or ruthless analysis of 
our modern criticism. God has doubtless spoken to the 
fathers, by the prophets,, "at sundry times and in divers man- 
ners," of which no record has come down to these lower 
generations. Only those members of the august fraternity, 
whose messages marked some epoch in the history of the 
Church or of the world, still live in the memories and 
mouths of men. The rest have been swept into the circle 
of some subsequent revelation, and vanished from our view. 
How many of these old fragments of prophecy may have 
fallen under the eye of Moses, as he penned the book of 
Genesis, we cannot surmise, God could, no doubt, have 
given him the whole story fresh from His own lips, if He 
had chosen ; but the mode in which the story is told irre- 
sistibly suggests the conclusion that the writer has embodied, 
and embalmed in his narrative old messages from the ante- 
diluvian and patriarchal ages, and has worked them up, 
under fresh breathings of the Spirit, into that wonderful 



24 MIRACLES AND PROPHECY. 

book of the beginnings of things, which stands as vestibule 
to the entire temple of revelation. 

But however the first book of the Bible may have risen 
into form in the mind of ]\Ioses, the narrative from the 
beginning of Exodus to the end of Deuteronomy, with the 
exception of a chapter or so at either extremity, is the 
record of the personal exploits and experiences of the great 
deliverer himself The Pentateuch, therefore, is virtually 
the prophecy of Moses. And what a message from the 
Most High do these five books contain ! It is true that 
history, psalmody, proverbial philosophy, prediction, are to 
follow, filling up the inter^-al between Moses and Christ ; 
but the total mas^ of revelation em.bodied in these is little 
more than the elucidation and enforcement of the ordinances 
of the Pentateuch. In that intermediate chasm no pinnacle 
springs up into the air to the level of the summit either of 
Sinai or of Calvan.'. Take vour station in the crc«-ore 
between these two mystic mountain heights, and you will 
find many secondar}^ ranges, running parallel, or thrown 
down athwart ; but take your station on the top of Sinai, 
and towering over all you see the top of Calvar}^ ; or take 
your station on the top of Calvar}^, and towering over all 
you see the top of Sinai. 

Let me seek to substantiate these statements. What 
then, in brief, is the burden of the revelation made to man 
through Closes } It is based upon three great facts, each 
one of which is stationed in the ver}^ forefront of the pro- 
phecy — the fact that man was originally upright ; the fact 
that he is now fallen ; and the fact that he is still salvable. 
The garden of Eden, the flaming sword of the angel, the 
promise that the seed of the woman should bruise the ser- 
pent's head — these are the three foundation-stones on which 
the whole structure of revelation rests. Thus on the very 
first cloud that stained the horizon of human history is 
planted the rainbow of promise and hope. 

The salvation thus shadowed forth, however, is still in the 
far future. And what, meanwhile, is man to do t Is he to 
dream away the long millennial day between the promise 



THE PROPHECY. 25 

and accomplishment in wistful wonderings and longings ? 
Or is he to defile it with foul continuations of the original 
offence ? No : he has a work to do, and to do as diligently 
as though upon the doing of that work depended his entire 
salvation. That work consisted of two departments — 
obedience to the moral law, and the offering np of sacrifice 
for sin. Both these departments of the work of God 
date from the very spring of human history. The first-born 
son oi Adam, neglecting the one part, and thereby vitiating 
the other part, rose up in a fit of ungovernable spleen, and 
slew the second-born, who, though perform.ing both parts 
rightly, had brought upon himself the blessing of God. 
Noah obeyed and offered sacrifice in his own earnest yet 
imperfect way, amidst an utterly demoralised society — a 
society which, even after it had been swept away by the 
flood, left the traces of its baleful influence in the old patri- 
arch's deed of intemperance, and in the mockery of Ham 
and curse of Canaan. Abraham was called out of the 
freshly accumulating gloom to begin anew the work of God ; 
and he obeyed and offered sacrifice with a trust so simple 
and unswerving, that he was dignified with the title of the 
" friend of God." And so the double work of obedience and 
oblation was handed down as an heirloom from father to 
son, till the day when Moses asked leave from Pharaoh to 
take Israel out a three days' journey into the wilderness, to 
sacrifice to the Lord their God. 

But now that Moses appears upon the scene the work is 
to be put upon a more definite and settled basis than before. 
The law regulating conduct is given in the form of the ten 
commandments, and the law regulating sacrifice is given 
in the form of the tabernacle service. The moral code and 
the propitiatory system of Moses lift up into themselves all 
the rules of conduct and sacrificial customs that had hitherto 
found place among the people of God, and fill them with 
fresh significance. And these remained precisely as Moses 
left them, till they were gathered up in turn into that gj-eater 
dispensation, to which, like finger-posts, they pointed fai'ward 
along the labouring cenluries. 



26 MIRACLES AND PROPHECY. 

For through these very two things of which I have been 
speaking, obedience and oblation, the salvation of man was 
to be achieved. A perfect obedience was the Divine event 
to which all these isolated acts of imperfect obedience were 
tending. An efficacious sacrifice was the Divine event of 
which all these ineffectual slaughterings of bulls and goats 
were the foreshadowings. Although the obedience which 
men were able to render, and the oblation which they were 
able to make, could not bring salvation, they were in the 
providential line of that which was to bring salvation. After 
the innumerable failures there was to be a grand success, 
both of obedience rendered, and of propitiation made. 
Jesus Christ was to do perfectly that double work of God 
which all men of God had been more or less successfully 
striving to do from the beginning of time. He was to render 
the great obedience, and make the great oblation, that 
should bring salvation into the world.. 

Now Moses had already sketched the scheme of salvation, 
in all its leading elements, in the ordinances which he brought 
down with him from Sinai. The tabernacle — its various com- 
partments and articles of furniture — the ark of the covenant, 
containing the tables of stone,, and covered by the mercy- 
seat with its shadowing cherubim — the table of shew-bread, 
and the branching candlestick — the brazea altar, smoking 
with slaughtered victims ; and the golden altar, sending up 
columns of white incense towards heaven — the unapproach- 
able glory, and the dividing veil — the series of feasts, and 
the series of offerings — the lustrations, the unctions, the 
consecrations by sprinkling of sacrificial blood — all these 
told forth more and more of their mystic meaning as the 
ages passed, till at last they flashed out into full realisation 
in the substitutionary life and death of our Lord, and found 
their exegesis for all coming time in the graphic and beau- 
tiful epistle to the Hebrews. 

It appears, therefore, that the plan of salvation which 
God devised from the beginning was fully formulated by 
Moses, and fully accomplished fifteen hundred years after- 
wards by Christ. Enough has been said to substantiate the 



THE PROPHECY. 27 

twofold affirmation that none of all the prophets was like 
Moses, and that Moses alone of all the prophets was like 
Messiah. Moses wrought out a national emancipation, 
which was itself a striking type of the spiritual deliverance 
wrought out by Emmanuel. Moses founded a dispensation 
in the kingdom of God, which was the preparation for the 
dispensation founded by Emmanuel. Moses uttered the 
most stupendous and adventurous prophecy of Christ the 
world has ever listened to — that involved in the ceremonial 
system of the wilderness. Moses brought down from 
heaven in the form of perfect precept that which Christ 
sent up to heaven in the form of perfect obedience. Moses 
beheld "the similitude of God." God spoke with him, 
"mouth to mouth, even apparently, and not in dark 
speeches." He was the standing representative of God 
from the day when he met with Him at the burning bush 
to the day when he passed back to Him from the peak of 
Nebo. His prophecy formed the text of which all other 
prophecies were but so many fragmentary expositions. 
Not only Micah and Malachi, but Isaiah and Jeremiah, were 
minor prophets in this grand comparison. They did little 
more than catch up the detached parts of his great prophecy, 
and give them forth in novel forms to the new generations. 
They succeeded at the best in scattering somewhat of the 
haze that hung about the figure of the Prophet towards 
whom the sin-laden centuries were hastening, and in 
clothing Him beforehand in some of His most significant 
attributes and fortunes. Isaiah's imagination of the man 
who was " wounded for our transgressions, and bruised for 
our iniquities," or Daniel's divination of the day when Messiah 
should be "cut off, but not for Himself," and should "cause 
the sacrifice and the oblation to cease," and " finish the trans- 
gression, and " make an end of sins," and " make reconcilia- 
tion for iniquity," and "bring in everlasting righteousness," 
and "seal up the vision and prophecy" — what were these, or 
whatever other delineations like these may be gathered 
out of the songs of the prophets, but the piecing together 
of the various parts of the sacrificial system instituted 



28 MIRACLES AND PROPHECY. 

under the shadow of Mount Sinai, and their application to 
the person of that Prophet whom God was to " raise up like 
unto" Moses. 

At the same time, there was a more or less continuous 
chain of prophets connecting the testimony of Moses with 
the Advent of Messiah. It was the business of these to 
explain the spirit of the ceremonial system, to show the 
subordination of all ritual observance to spirituality of mind 
and morality of life, and to bring out into more and more 
vivid relief the lineaments of that all-glorious Person, in 
whom a perfect obedience was rendered, and a perfect 
propitiation made. 

Before individualising the prophets, however, it may be 
well to refer to some of their common characteristics. 

1. The first characteristic of the Old Testament prophecy is, 
that it points away onward to a larger and Jiappier day than 
any that had yet dawned npon the world. This pathos of pro- 
phecy can perhaps nowhere be more fittingly illustrated 
than by the language of Moses himself, " Unto Him shall 
ye hearken." " Against me ye have been murmuring my 
whole life through : but in that kindlier time when the 
Prophet like unto me shall arise, ye shall be moved to awe 
and to obedience." But passing Moses, all the prophetic 
messages, however dark and terrible in their import, are 
illuminated by glorious plays of light flung down upon them 
from some distant dawn, to which, with unfaltering finger, 
they point forward through the gloom. 

2. Another characteristic of tJie Old Testament prophecy is, 
that it continually clashes with the spirit of the age in which it 
is uttered. The catholicity of the prophets contrasts with the 
narrow-mindedness of the nation. The Israelites believed 
themselves not only to have a first charge upon the grace 
of heaven and covenant promises of God, but to be also 
the residuary legatees of these. The prophets, on the other 
hand, uniformly spoke of a world-wide Gospel of salvation, 
and a universal gathering of the nations within the bonds 
of the everlasting covenant. Again, the spirituality of the 
prophets contrasts with the carnal-mindedness of the nation. 



THE PROPHECY. 29 

Israel was evermore going forth after fresh idolatries and 
immoralities. Doubtless, there was always among them a 
residue of godly-minded and right-living men. We are 
aware, however, that even the best specimens of any given 
generation of men will not rise strikingly high above the 
general level of religion and morality. Men mount up into 
pinnacles of good, or sink back into abysses of evil, in 
masses, and not by isolated efforts of the individual. Yet 
even in the darkest days of Israel's apostasy arose the 
prophets, sometimes in sublime solitariness, sometimes in 
groups of two or three, addressing the degenerate mass of 
men in burning words of rebuke or admonition, and proving 
their sincerity by lives in the main in harmony with their 
message, and at all points at variance with the thought and 
feeling of the time. 

3. The prophets invariably approach their task with a deep 
sense of responsibility^ amounting often to relnctance, or even 
to anguish of spirit. The message they had to deliver 
sometimes crossed their own prejudices as much as those 
of the people they addressed. Moses shrinks from his 
mission, and can scarcely be persuaded to assume the 
leadership of the Israelitish host. Jonah writhes and 
strains like a dog upon the leash to escape from Nineveh. 
But even when the will of the prophet was entirely subdued 
to the will of God, the character of his message was such 
as to fill him with painful misgivings. It must have been 
trying in the highest degree to Nathan to announce to 
David, " Thou art the man !" and to Gad to give the king 
the ghastly choice between famine, war, and pestilence. 
Right well did Michaiah, the son of Imlah, know that bread 
of affliction, and water of affliction, would be the reward of 
his unwelcome disclosure to a monarch who had already 
said, " I hate him ; for he doth not prophecy good con- 
cerning me, but evil." Isaiah begins his great prophecy, 
" Hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth : for the Lord hath 
spoken, I have nourished and brought up children, and they 
have rebelled against me." Jeremiah testifies, "As for me, 
I have not hastened from being a pastor to follow Thee ; 



30 MIRACLES AND PROPHECY. 

neither have I desired the woeful day, Thou knowest." 
A roll of a book is spread out before Ezekiel ; " and it was 
written within and without ; and there was written therein 
lamentations and mourning and woe." 

4. The treatment which the prophets received at the hands 
of the people, besides, tended to inteitsify the gloom which 
brooded over their spirits. Not for nothing did they set 
before Israel the story of her spiritual sorceries. Moses 
himself was more than once on the brink of being mur- 
dered. Elijah was hounded out of the land by the emis- 
saries of Ahab. Jeremiah was flung into a miry pit, and 
finally put to death. To sum up, " they were sawn asunder,' 
were tempted, were slain with the sword : they wandered 
about in sheepskins and goatskins ; being destitute, afflicted, 
tormented ; of whom the world was not worthy ; they 
wandered in deserts, and in mountains, and in dens and 
caves of the earth." 

5. But irrespective of the treatment which they received, 
it added to the embarrassment of the prophets, that the import 
of the burden which they bore was to a large extent unknown 
to themselves. The accomplishment of prophecy is the only 
real interpretation of prophecy ; and the accomplishment of 
all that, was greatest in prophecy did not take place till four 
centuries after the last of the prophets had ceased to speak. 
Yet who could be so absorbingly concerned in the import of 
each particular prediction as the man who uttered it } 
Hence those wistful scrutinies of which the apostle Peter 
speaks : — " Of which salvation the prophets have inquired 
and searched diligently, who prophesied of the grace that 
should come unto you, searching what or what manner of 
time the Spirit of Christ which was in them did signify, 
when it testified beforehand the sufferings of Christ and the 
glory that should follow." 

From the forward glance into futurity, then, which is the 
common characteristic of the prophets ; from the catholicity 
and spirituality of the kingdom which they announced ; from 
the shock which these announcements gave to the popular 
prejudice; from the gloom with which the prophetic function 



THE PROPHECY. 31 

was invested ; from the reluctance with which it was assumed ; 
from the painful consequences by which the testimonies of 
the prophets were attended ; and from the sore perplexities 
begotten within their own minds by the burdens which they 
bore, we are driven irresistibly to the conclusion that the 
Old Testament prophecy cannot be accounted for on natural 
grounds, and that those who uttered it must have been men 
who "spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost." 

But let me now proceed to particularise. There is a growth 
observable in the fulness and clearness of the prophetic 
revelations as we pass from the time of Moses to the time of 
Christ. I purposely pass over the great prophet-preachers, 
such as Samuel, and Elijah, and Elisha, because their influ- 
ence was mainly personal, their mission was to deal with a 
present emergency rather than point forward to a future 
object of hope, and they have left no written record of 
their words behind them. Written prophecy is comprised 
within a period stretching from the middle of the ninth to 
the end of the fourth century before Christ. 

The first author of written prophecy is Jonah. His mis- 
sion was to Nineveh, and it was purely local and temporary 
in its nature. He brings out the great truth, however, that 
there is forgiveness with God where there is repentance with 
man; that "God has no pleasure in the death of the 
wicked," whatever be his nationality ; " but that the wicked 
turn from his way and live" — a doctrine most unpalatable 
to the prophet himself, no less than to his fellow-country- 
men. 

Next follows Joel. Joel, coming less than half-a-century 
later, exhibits a very appreciable spiritual advance on 
Jonah. Jonah had said upbraidingly, "I know that Thou art 
a gracious God, and merciful, slow to anger, and of great 
kindness, and repentest Thee of the evil." Joel says ap- 
provingly, " Rend your heart and not your garments, and 
turn unto the Lord your God ; for He is gracious and 
merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness, and repenteth 
Him of the evil." The phrase is the same in the two pas- 
sages; but the spirit is strongly contrasted. Moreover, Joel 



32 



MIRACLES AND PROPHECY. 



shows that repentance is but the preparation for the pleni- 
tude of spiritual life, a spiritual life which is imported into 
the soul by the power of God — "It shall come to pass 
afterward that I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh." 
And this promise, fulfilling itself at all times among the 
people of God, meets with its grandest illustration on the 
day of Pentecost. 

Next follow Hosea and Amos. Widely diverse in style 
as these two prophets are, they are filled with the same high 
impulse. The lament of Hosea and the philippic of Amos 
are alike called forth by the heartless formalities of the age. 
(Compare Hosea vi. 6; and Amos v. 21-24.) Each, more- 
over, makes a remarkable statement regarding the future 
state of Israel, in which its returning fortunes are mys- 
teriously connected with the name of David (Hosea iii. 4. 
5 ; Amos ix. 1 1). The sharp sword of a spiritual religion, 
leaping out of the sheath of a ceremonial that serves but a 
temporary end, and may soon be flung aside for ever, such is 
the common thought which, under varied imagery, these 
two prophets present to view. 

Next follow Micah and Isaiah. Micah brings out more 
eloquently than either Hosea or Amos the paramount 
superiority of the moral over the ritual (Micah vi. 6-8). 
He furnishes us with the most definite note yet given of the 
Advent of Messiah, announcing in one sentence His earthly 
birth-place, and the fact of His eternal pre-existence, " But 
thou, Bethlehem-Ephratah," &c. (Micah v. 2.) In describ- 
ing the diffusive and assimilative power of the kingdom 
that is to come, he uses language which his greater con- 
temporary, Isaiah, thinks it worth while to quote in the 
beginning of his prophecy, " In the last days it shall come 
to pass that the mountain of the house of the Lord," &c. 
(Micah iv. i, 2.) 

It is Isaiah, however, that gives us the first vivid delinea- 
tions of the Person and Work of Messiah. He tells how 
" a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call His 
name Immanuel" (Isaiah vii. 14) — how "unto us a Child 
is born, unto us a Son is given : and the government shall 



THE PROPHECY. 33 

be upon His shoulder : and His name shall be called 
Father, The Prince of Peace " (Isaiah ix. 6, 7) — how " there 
shall come forth a Rod out of the stem of Jesse, and a 
Branch shall grow out of his roots : and the Spirit of the 
Lord shall rest upon Him, the spirit of wisdom and under- 
standing, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of 
knowledge and of the fear of the Lord " (Isaiah xi. i, 2) — 
how " He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows 
and acquainted with grief . . . But He was wounded for 
our transgressions. He was bruised for our iniquities : the 
chastisement of our peace was upon Him ; and with His 
stripes we are healed" (Isaiah liii. 3, 5) — how "it shall come 
to pass, that from one new moon to another, and from one 
sabbath to another, shall all flesh come to worship before 
me, saith the Lord" (Isaiah Ixvi. 23). 

Nahums prophecy, like Jonah's, is exclusively concerned 
about Nineveh. Yet it contains that evangelical echo of 
Isaiah, " Behold upon the mountains the feet of him that 
bringeth good tidings, that pubHsheth peace " (Nah. i. 1 5). 

The prophecy of Zephaniah is a strain of denunciation 
against the evil of the age, leaving room, however, for the 
recuperative power of repentance — " Seek righteousness, seek 
meekness : it may be ye shall be hid in the day of the Lord's 
anger" — and wound up by an allusion to the happy time, 
when " it shall be said to Jerusalem, fear not ; and to Zion, 
let not thine hands be slack." 

Next follows Jeremiah, the most hated of the prophets 
while he lived ; the most highly honoured after his death. 
He describes in one memorable passage the Davidic descent, 
the Divine character, and the substitutionary work of Mes- 
siah : — " Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that I will 
raise unto David a righteous Branch, and a King shall reign 
and prosper, and shall execute judgment and justice in the 
earth. In His days Judah shall be saved, and Israel shall 
dwell safely : and this is His name whereby He shall be 
called, The Lord our Righteousness " (Jcr. xxiii. 5, 6). 

Contemporary with Zephaniah and Jeremiah is Habakkiik. 
Habakkuk foretells the Chaldean invasion of Judah. His 
C 



34 MIRACLES AND PROPHECY. 

prophecy forms a curious mosaic of holy psalms and 
musings, inlaid in broad margins of denunciation and 
derision. In the middle of it occurs that graphic forecast 
of the universal kingdom, copied from Isaiah, " The earth 
shall be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord, 
as the waters cover the sea." 

Next follow Ezekiel and Daniel, prophets of the captivity 
— Ezekiel, the prophet of obscure allusion ; Daniel, the 
prophet of categorical assertion. In his celebrated shepherd 
song, however, Ezekiel says as explicitly as any of the 
prophets, " I will set up one shepherd over them, and he 
shall feed them, even my servant David ; he shall feed 
them, and he shall be their shepherd. And I the Lord 
will be their God, and my servant David a prince among 
them" (Ezek. xxxiv. 23, 24). In another place he catches 
up the thought of Joel concerning the work of the Holy 
Spirit, and puts it in a more emphatic form (Ezek. xxxvi. 
25-28). His famous valley vision also contains a vivid 
description of the revival of spiritual life under the figure 
of a physical resurrection (Ezek. xxxvii. 1-14). 

Daniel alone of all the prophets gives us a definite note 
of the time of the Advent — "After threescore and two 
weeks shall Messiah be cut off" (Dan. ix. 26). He sketches 
in bold pictorial strokes the successive rise of the great 
world-monarchies, and the introduction of the kingdom that 
shall never be destroyed. The temporary nature of the 
Mosaic economy, and the final and permanent nature of 
that dispensation in which it is to be absorbed — this grand 
prophetic truth, impregnating the teachings of all the 
prophets, and presented under various metaphors and 
analogies, is announced by Daniel with startling plainness 
of speech (Dan. ix. 24-27 ; xii. 1 1). Equally startling is 
the emphasis with which the prophet propounds the 
doctrine of the Resurrection (Dan. xii. 2, 3). 

In ObadiaJis brief prophecy against Edom occurs the 
evangelical forecast, " But upon Mount Zion shall be de- 
liverance, and there shall be holiness" (i. 17). 

Next follow Haggai and Zechariah, the prophets of the 



THE PROPHECY. 35 

second temple. With these sublime anticipations, Haggai 
encourages Zerubbabel and the builders, " I will shake all 
nations, and the desire of all nations shall come : and I will 
fill this house with glory, saith the Lord of hosts. The 
silver is mine, and the gold is mine, saith the Lord of hosts. 
The glory of this latter house shall be greater than of the 
former, saith the Lord of hosts : and in this place will I 
give peace, saith the Lord of hosts" (Hag. ii. 7-9). 

Zechariah twice repeats Isaiah's and Jeremiah's promise 
of the Branch (iii. 8 ; vi. 12, 13). He foretells the Hosanna 
procession (ix. 9), the purchase of the potter's field with the 
thirty pieces of silver (xi. 12, 13), the outpouring of the 
spirit of grace and of supplications (xii. 10), the opening of 
the fountain for sin and for uncleanness (xiii. i), the 
wounding and death of the man who is God's fellow (xiii. 

6,7)- 

Next, after a century's lapse, arises the last of the 

prophets, Malachi. Malachi announces with fresh impres- 
siveness the catholicity of the coming kingdom of God 
(i. 11), and what was involved in that, the withdrawal of. 
the prerogative from Israel. He tells of the Advent of the 
Forerunner, followed by the Advent of the Christ (iii. 1-3). 
Then at the very close of his prophecy occur these three 
significant announcements, " Unto you that fear my name 
shall the Sun of Righteousness arise with healing in His 
wings" — "Remember ye the law of Moses my servant, 
which I commanded unto him in Horeb" — "Behold, I will 
send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great 
and dreadful day of the Lord." Thus vv^ith Moses, Elias, 
and the Sun of Righteousness — the three great figures of 
the Transfiguration scene — the curtain falls for ever on the 
Old Testament prophecy. 

Now the first thing that strikes us, from a review of the 
teachings of the prophets, is the essential concord of senti- 
ment and testimony by which they are marked. A series 
of compositions, extending over several hundreds of years, 
and produced under every variety of circumstance, political, 
social, and moral, arc found to sound in absolute unison with 



36 MIRACLES AND PROPHECY. 

one another ; while at the same time they invariably clash 
with the tone of the popular sentiment, and portray a 
futurity which involves, among other things, the overthrow 
of the national life, and the extension to all nations indis- 
criminately of blessings which were supposed to be the 
peculiar privilege of the Jew. The prophets resemble a row 
of lights, planted at intervals along a road leading through 
a dark night towards a distant dayspring. In one form or 
other that line of illumination stretches from the time of 
Moses down to the time of Malachi ; whether as soldier- 
prophets, like Joshua and Gideon ; or as orator-prophets, 
like Samuel and Elijah; or as those whose memorial remains 
in what they have written. Between the last of the series, 
however, and the rising of the Sun of Righteousness, four 
centuries must elapse without one murmur from a pro- 
phet's lip. But in whatever form it appears, or through 
whatever interval it disappears, the Old Testament pro- 
phecy speaks one uniform word of hope and promise. 

And when in the fulness of time Christ came, and the 
Christian system burst upon the world, the result abundantly 
justified the promise. Christianity more than accomplishes 
all the conditions laid down in the sacrificial system, and the 
continuous chain of prophetic testimony. The unapproach- 
able perfection of the person and work of our Lord was 
brought out in living words and deeds as it could never have 
been brought out in prophetic song or symbol. The New 
Testament contains a tremendous surprise. Its introductory 
angel-songs and salutations of holy men and women but 
faintly shadow forth, indeed, the priceless benefit conferred 
upon the world by the appearance of the Prince of Peace in 
Bethlehem. Society was not to know for some years yet 
what a Plant of Renown had struck root in its unwholesome 
soil. Even to the end of His earthly days, none but Christ's 
closest followers were furnished with a key to unlock the 
mystery of that immaculate life, nor even they till the 
Resurrection and the Outpouring of the Spirit had followed 
the Death and Burial. Christ's contemporaries could not be 
judges, in the way in which their successors could be judges, 



THE PROPHECY. 37 

of the perfect correspondence which exists between the 
preparation and the accompHshment. GHmpses have been 
granted to us, such as were not granted even to Paul and 
Peter, into the character of the kingdom of Christ. They 
saw the machinery beginning its grand world-movement ; 
we have seen something of the splendid spiritual effects of 
the movement. There is not a nation in the world where 
the glad sound has not been heard in its initial tones at least. 
Christianity came into the world, disappointing the hope 
alike of the godly and ungodly. While that disappointment 
deepened into hostility in the ungodly, it rose into an 
irresistible enthusiasm in the godly. Christianity has ele- 
vated and sweetened society, as a whole, beyond anything 
known in the preparatory dispensation ; and in the precise 
proportion in which its precepts are carried out is man lifted 
up to the level of his own ideal of perfection in purity, 
charity, reverence, self-denial, and all that gives savour and 
dignity to life. 

It is one of the paradoxes of prophecy that it announces 
almost in the same breath ruin and universal empire, doom 
and everlasting salvation. Israel is to be scattered and 
peeled ; yet she is to gather all nations into her holy fold. 
The Christian Church is the only possible solution of the 
problem. The political Israel has passed away. The 
social Israel lives a life of painful and ignoble dismember- 
ment — a life, nevertheless, that strikingly illustrates the 
forecastings of the prophets concerning her. The spiritual 
Israel, framed as she was in the beginning out of the 
materials of the social Israel, both in the founders and in 
the first professors of the Christian faith, is daily drawing 
the nations under her high influence. 

It is another of the paradoxes of prophecy that the 
Messiah was to sink and perish, and yet to ascend an ever- 
lasting throne. So perplexing was the play of cross-lights 
here, that many students of prophecy resorted to the theory 
of two Messiahs, a suffering and a triumphing. It seemed 
incredible that the "Plant of Renown" should be "a Root 
out of a dry ground" — that the " Wonderful, the Counsellor, 



38 MIRACLES AND PROPHECY. 

the mighty God" should be one who "was wounded for our 
transgressions, and bruised for our iniquities." We are 
aware how exactly the Divine and human nature of our 
Lord, taken in connection with His substitutionary work 
and mediatorial reign, has solved the problem. 

The several books of the Old Testament prophecy then 
speak, as we have seen, in broken tones the same unbroken 
story. The story finds no adequate interpretation in the 
musings of a whole millennium of pious minds, ranging from 
the time of Moses till the time of Malachi. The story finds 
a full interpretation in the person and work of Christ. It 
would have been impossible that a series of separate 
treatises, spread over so many centuries, should have told 
the same story with an almost monotonous reiteration, 
amidst every variety of surrounding circumstance, and in 
the teeth of perpetual antagonisms, except upon the suppo- 
sition that the impress of one mind was stamped upon them 
all. And whose mind could stretch over the intellectual 
vicissitudes of a thousand years, and preserve itself un- 
changed amidst the infinite flux of circumstance, save His, 
" with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning," 
and in whose sight " a thousand years are but as yesterday 
when it is past, and as a watch in the night" ? Prophecy 
finds at length the full vindication of its claims, as, narrowing 
down through the advancing centuries, it peacefully alights, 
like a dove, upon the head of Christ. 

Hence it is that the New Testament, or the account of 
the Advent, Sacrifice, and Triumph of' Christ, based as it is 
upon the foundation of " Moses and the prophets," is the 
fortress of all truth and purity and hope to the end of time. 
The New Testament lies concealed in the Old : the Old 
stands revealed in the New. Each, therefore, at once proves 
and is proved by the other. The doctrine of the Cross can 
never be surmounted by anything higher than itself; for it 
teaches us to aspire after that which is highest both for 
ourselves and others ; and the extent to which the ideals it 
holds forth are realised is precisely the measure of the 
extent to which either the man or the nation advances in 



THE PROPHECY. 39 

whatsoever things are true, and honest, and just, and pure, 
and lovely, and of good report. 

The Bible is grandly catholic too, alike in its spirit and 
applications. It speaks to all the lands and all the ages. 
The most widely-divided nations and centuries find a 
common home of pious thought and purpose in its pages. 
In whatever is merely scientific, or artistic, or industrial, it 
no more speaks to the nineteenth century before Christ in 
the language of the nineteenth century after, than it speaks 
to the nineteenth century after Christ in the language of 
the nineteenth century before. A phraseology in harmony 
with the scientific attainments of the present age would 
have been infinitely more embarrassing to the patriarchs 
and prophets than a phraseology in harmony with the 
opinions of those early ages could possibly be to us. But 
while using the popular speech of the time in things natural, 
in things spiritual the Scripture speaks like an everlasting 
oracle. Each age finds in it what suits its own distinctive 
needs, and thereby brings out by fresh experiment the 
prophetic power of the book. It is one wide-sweeping 
prophecy, responding evermore to the rising and falling 
cries of the coming and going generations of men. It is 
never obsolete, never out of place. There is a life in it that 
never dies, a light that never is eclipsed. It breathes. It 
moves. It has hands and feet. It has peering eyes and 
listening ears. It has a thrilling brain and a throbbing 
heart. It is " quick and powerful, sharper than any two- 
edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul 
and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner 
of the thoughts and intents of the heart." The difference 
between the Bible and every other book is the difference 
between the coarse effects of a painting and the infinite 
finish of a piece of natural landscape. Apply the micro- 
scope to the most delicate and perfect work of art, and its 
comeliness is changed into ungainliness. Apply it to a 
blade of grass or the petal of a lily, and the grace of the 
fashion of flower or leaf is only enhanced by that narrower 
inspection. There are effects in art, but there arc depths 



40 MIRACLES AND PROPHECY. 

in nature ; there are effects in human hterature, but there are 
depths in the Word of God. There is wear and tear in art. 
but in nature there is a prerogative of perpetual youth. 
There is wear and tear in human Hterature, " but the Word 
of God abideth for ever." It discloses more and more of its 
meaning, moreover, alike to the advancing man and to the 
advancing race. The youth sees what the child has failed 
to see ; the old man sees what the youth has failed to see. 
Augustine saw something which Ignatius had not seen ; 
Anselm saw something which Augustine had not seen; 
Luther saw something which Anselm had not seen; we 
are seeing something now which Luther did not see. But 
all that all have seen, and much that may still remain in- 
visible to us, is wrapped up in the living words of James 
and Peter, John and Paul. Till the day of realisation 
comes, the words of the Book of books may be little different 
from other words ; for the minds of men are blinded by sin. 
But when the day of realisation comes, they clothe them- 
selves with terrible power and glory ; they fall from men's 
mouths, carrying vital fragments of men's hearts along with 
them ; they form the core of all spiritual life, the spring of 
all missionary enterprise. 

To such as sigh over the cessation of those supernatural 
signs that bound together, by physical links, the heaven and 
earth of an older age, let it suffice to say that it is not the 
outward prodigy, but the inward grace, that brings salvation 
to the soul ; and that, in the existence of the Word of God 
among us, in the perpetuation of its holy ordinances, in 
the immortality of its story of love, and in the victories it 
is hourly achieving in the world, we have a miracle perpetu- 
ally performed, a prophecy perpetually accomplished. 



o^/ ^ • O ' 



iragq tit |l^latt0tt io Jattttjal 3^atti. 



REV. PROFESSOR WALLACE. 



PRAYER IN RELATION TO NATURAL LAW. 



(X AN God answer prayer ? One can fancy a slmple- 
^ minded, true-hearted Christian, Httle acquainted with 
modern speculation, on hearing such a question, exclaiming 
with genuine dismay, "Did ever anybody doubt it? It 
is a profanation to ask it." Yet the question is by 
many in our day answered in the negative. We are 
obliged to deal with it as a debatable question, and to 
try to show that in the course and constitution of nature 
there is place for prayer, and for answer to prayer. The 
question of the efficacy of prayer is one of more than specu- 
lative interest It is one which involves issues altogether 
vital to the Christian, vital to the human race. If prayer 
were displaced from the position of influence which it has 
occupied from the beginning in the religious life, who could 
estimate the change in nature and extent which religious 
thought and religious experience must undergo .-* Accus- 
tomed as we have been to regard prayer as a vital element 
in the Christian life, necessary to its strength, to its peace, 
to its confidence, to its practical activity, we cannot but 
feel that a cessation of its action would be the privation of 
life. Let any Christian remember, when at any time his 
prayer-faith has been low and languid, what the effect has 
been upon his experience, upon his peace, upon his joy, 
upon the spirit with which he fulfilled his usual round of 
duty, and it may help him to realise in some measure what 
the effect would be of losing all faith in its efficacy, and of 
abandoning it altogether. By the universal consent of all 
Christians, prayer is the exercise of all others in which the 
soul cultivates and maintains most intimately its intercourse 
with God, in which filial confidence and love find their 
sweetest and most earnest expression, and in which the 



CAN GOD ANSWER PRAYER? 



sense of dependence glows into a fervour of joyful trust. 
There is not a living Christian who does not feel that if the 
conviction were forced upon him that prayer could not be 
answered, he would have no life left. And what would be 
his thought of God, and his feeling towards Him ? He is 
told that God has bound Himself by laws of procedure so 
rigid and inflexible, that He has not left Himself at liberty 
to answer the petition of any suppliant, plead how he may. 
He sits apart, unmoved by his straits, his dangers, his sor- 
rows, his cries for help. If this be true, trust is as unwarran- 
ted and vain as prayer. Faith has no resting-place for the 
sole of her foot, unless she takes fixed and immutable laws for 
her God ; for upon such a theory, it is with law, and not 
with a living God, that man has to do. All filial feeling 
towards God must cease. If He has no power to help, why 
should we trust Him ? If He manifests no care for us by 
answering our petitions, how can we believe Him to be a 
God of love .'' And how, then, can ^^e love Him .'* We lose 
our trust. We lose our love. Religion cannot exist without 
faith and love. If prayer cannot be answered, there can be 
no religion. This is the inevitable, the appalling conclusion. 
And with the loss of faith in the efficacy of prayer, faith 
in the truth of Revelation becomes impossible. The efficacy 
of prayer and the credibility of Revelation must stand or 
fall together. Revelation everywhere affirms the efficacy of 
prayer. It represents God as the hearer of prayer, com- 
manding and encouraging men to pray to Him, promising 
to bestow every form of good, temporal and spiritual, 
in answer to prayer, and threatening to withhold good 
when prayer is restrained. He is represented as pos- 
sessing such full and entire control over the laws and 
ordinances of nature, animate and inanimate, as ever to be 
free at His own will to bestow out of the fulness of nature's 
treasures whatsoever His suppliants may need and desire. 
In regard to everything which affects human interests for 
mind or body, over the elements and processes of nature, 
over all that ministers to the fertility of the earth — the rain, 
the dew, the sunshine — over health and disease, over all the 



CAN GOD ANSWER PRAYER? 5 

laws of life, over death itself, there is ascribed to God a 
complete and sovereign control. No less there is ascribed 
to Him power over mind — to determine its judgments, to 
rule its experiences, to cause men to walk in His statutes, 
to keep His judgments and to do them. Kings' hearts, the 
life and interests of nations, peace and war, defeat and 
victory, the honour or disgrace of dynasties, their preserva- 
tion or extinction — all are in His hands, at His free and 
sovereign disposal Laws of matter, laws of life, laws of 
mind, laws of social order, are represented as His servants, 
serving, and not limiting. His freedom of will and of action 
— servants of His power, servants of His wisdom, servants of 
His free and generous beneficence to the children of men. 

If this whole representation be false — if there be a proved 
impossibility in the nature of things, that God could answer 
prayer without deranging the order of nature and reducing 
it to chaos, with the effect of the destruction of all life — 
then the Bible is a fable, its whole internal evidence is 
discredited, and no other form of evidence could prove it 
divine. The efficacy of prayer, therefore, is just as decisive 
a battle-ground as any other for testing the claims and 
credibihty of Revelation. 

There are some who are willing to acknowledge that, 
although prayer can have no effect in changing the course 
of nature, yet that God in answer to prayer may influence 
the human mind for good. But the laws of mind are as 
fixed and steadfast as the laws of matter ; and it would be 
as much an interference with natural law to change the 
succession of thought as to dispel clouds or send a shower 
to water the earth. 

Others say that although the answer to prayer is im- 
possible, yet that men ought to pray, because the reflex 
influence is good — the mind is benefited by the exercise. 
This is altogether contrary to reason and common sense, 
and I think it very doubtful whether the experiment has 
ever been tried on any considerable scale, or with much 
perseverance. A reflex benefit implies a direct benefit as 
its proper antecedent — ^just as there must be a direct 



6 WHAT IS PRAYER ? 

incidence of a ray of light before there can be a reflection 
of it. Prayer would be universally abandoned as purpose- 
less and vain if no answer were ever to be expected. The 
answer to prayer is necessary to prayer. Could it be felt to 
be a healthy and helpful exercise of mind to repair to some 
great man's door, morning by morning, or as often as I felt 
the pressure of want and the need of help, to present my 
petition with a reverence due to his greatness, and with an 
earnestness and importunity inspired by my need, while I 
know that he has bound himself by inflexible rules never to 
grant a petition ? God ever treats us as rational beings, 
and never so outrages the gift of reason which He has 
bestowed upon us as to require life-long prayer, knowing 
beforehand that all our asking is vain. 

I am restricted by the terms of the subject before me to 
treat of prayer in its relation to natural law ; and I shall 
first seek for an answer to the question — 

I. — What is Prayer ? 

And here let us regard it strictly in its own proper nature, 
with whatever diversity its proper nature admits, without at 
present including such collateral ideas as may attach them- 
selves to it, or be attendant upon it. Thus regarding it, we 
have a statement of the nature and end of prayer, which, even 
apart from the source whence it springs, commends itself to 
every mind by its truth, by its simplicity, and by its ex- 
haustiveness — "Ask, and it shall be given you ; seek, and 
ye shall find ; knock, and it shall be opened unto you." * 
Observe that asking and receiving are correlative ideas ; as 
are also seeking and finding, knocking and opening. The 
aim of the first term in each of these pairs is to secure the 
second. In other words, the very nature of prayer consists 
in its direct influence, and not in its reflex. Its reflex 
influence is not noticed, because not entering into its proper 
nature. Receiving proves the direct influence of asking, 
finding of seeking, opening of knocking. Our Lord gives 

* Luke xi. 9. 



WHAT IS PRAYER? 7 

two illustrative examples of prayer in the social relations of 
human life. One is the case of a man who wakes up his 
neighbour at night, to ask him to lend him three loaves 
to set before a friend who has come to him unexpectedly. 
By dint of importunity he overcomes the drowsy reluctance 
of his neighbour, and he receives what he asks. The other 
instance is stated thus — " If a son shall ask bread of any of 
you that is a father, will he give him a stone } or if he ask a 
fish, will he for a fish give him a serpent ? or if he shall ask an 
egg, will he offer him a scorpion .'*" In each case an answer is 
expected ; and hence our reason teaches us that the desire 
and expectation of an answer enters into the very nature of 
prayer. When a man asks bread, it is bread he desires to 
receive, and not a change of the state of his mind. If 
prayer were only beneficial in its reflex effect, then, whether 
a son gets bread or a stone or nothing for his asking, the 
reflex benefit ought to be experienced all the same. The 
answering must correspond to the asking ; and then the 
reflex benefit may often be more precious than the direct. 
When you have received the gift you ask, there may be a 
very welcome feeling of relief from some strait or embar- 
rassment — there is peace, there is a grateful sense of the 
kindly response, an impulse to requite it, and, it may be, an 
expansion of your own generous feeling towards others. All 
this is a very agreeable reflex experience. But if no answer 
had been vouchsafed to your petition, or if you had received 
a stone when you asked bread, would you have enjoyed an 
experience of this precious and happy character ? We may 
well be disposed to ask, whether there be men who set 
themselves deliberately to test practically the value of a 
theory so adverse to human reason .'* 

We learn also from these illustrations, that prayer or 
petition from man to man is the same in nature as from 
man to God, and that prayer belongs to the natural life of 
man as necessarily as to the spiritual. And we learn the 
function of prayer in the natural life, and prove its efficacy 
directly and reflexly before we have any experience of the 
.spiritual life. We are natural men before we become 



8 WHAT IS PRAYER? 

spiritual. We are conscious of our natural relations before 
we become conscious of the spiritual. We are conscious of 
natural wants and desires before we are conscious of 
those which are spiritual. " That was not first which is 
spiritual, but that which is natural, and afterwards that 
which is spiritual." It is within the natural relations we test 
our powers and become acquainted with their action, and in 
Avhich we observe their phenomena and deduce their laws. 
And when their action is transferred to the spiritual sphere, 
we find their laws unchanged, and all their phenomena 
similar. That which is changed consists in the deposing of 
the former objects from their place of influence, and in 
yielding to God the supreme rule and authority. It is He 
who now engages their action, not to the exclusion of the 
natural, but to their subordination. Our relation with God 
we call a spiritual relation ; and the action of our powers 
within that relation we call spiritual. Our experience is 
then a spiritual experience ; and every term which denotes 
it has first served to denote a natural experience, so that 
the natural and the spiritual have a common language. 
Love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, 
meekness, temperance, are natural experiences of the human 
soul before they become graces of the Spirit. In like man- 
ner the principles and acts of worship have their basis in 
nature, and their natural action in our human relations. 
We reverence parents and magistrates, and others whose 
superiority we acknowledge ; and we express that reverence 
by speech, and by various forms and symbols of homage. 
We praise men for their gifts and excellences ; for their 
wisdom, their benevolence ; for their fidelity and fortitude. 
We supplicate men to help us ; we entreat them to bestow 
favours upon us, to guide and counsel us, to have mercy 
upon us, and to forgive us. All worship, reverence, homage, 
praise, prayer, has its place in nature, and finds its earliest 
expression in our natural relations. 



PRAYER A LAW OF NATURE. 



II. — Prayer a Law of Nature. 

Our position, then, is this, that prayer is an original 
element in the constitution of nature, a law of nature, co- 
ordinate with every other law, and of co-ordinate necessity 
to the order of nature. It belongs to the sphere of life, 
to living organisms and their relations, and is necessary to 
the maintenance and government of those relations. The 
laws of life are wholly different from those of matter. Life 
does not submit itself to sense-perception ; it is invisible, 
intangible. It cannot be weighed nor measured. It is the 
great mystery of science, to the elucidation of which no 
approach has yet been made. It occupies a place in nature 
single and alone. It is a class by itself It cannot be compared 
with anything known. It proves its superiority to matter 
and to its laws, by framing and building up the particles 
of matter into the infinitely diversified organic structures 
which it inhabits, and by the marvellous and mysterious 
instincts by which it rules the organisms which it constructs, 
controlling their action, their growth and reproduction. 
The relations among living organisms, also, are altogether 
different from the relations of particles or masses of matter 
amongst each other. Amongst organisms so low and 
diminutive as to be readily overlooked, polypes, "when 
3.ggrQgsited into groups, severally catch food for the com- 
mon weal." This implies a power of communication, and 
of entertaining a common end. There is nothing similar to 
this in the relations of matter. Even amongst merely sen- 
tient beings, the laws which rule man's sentient life are 
found in action ; and asking and receiving, seeking and 
finding, belong to this class of laws. Something like this 
must take place by natural instinct, in such a class of beings 
as has just been referred to, in order to their carrying out 
a common end. But, passing by the lower organisms, the 
natural instinct to ask manifests itself, in those species of 
animals with which we are most familiar, in a perfectly 
conspicuous way. The fundamental condition, out of which 



10 PRAYER A LAW OF NATURE. 

the necessity for asking and receiving arises, is a state of 
dependence. Living beings are dependent upon one another 
to a greater or less extent, for food, for care, for combined 
action, for mutual help and defence. For such ends the 
several species have their necessary associations, from pairs 
up to numerous individuals in herds and flocks. To a state 
of dependence there necessarily attaches the incidence of 
want. A being which has not the resources of its continued 
existence and well-being within itself, is exposed to want. 
As a general rule, the young of all the higher classes of animals 
are dependent upon the female parent in their early days for 
their necessary nutriment. The ever-recurring feeling of 
hunger awakens the desire for satisfaction ; and the desire is 
ever supplied with a suitable means of expressing itself, by 
which the want is made known to the being possessing the 
supply. That being infallibly interprets the suppliant sign, 
infallibly knows herself to possess the needed supply, or 
where to find it ; and by an infallible instinct hastens to 
yield it, and the desire is satisfied. Here are all the 
elements of effectual prayer, asking and receiving, seeking 
and finding. And this ever-recurring order is necessary to 
the preservation at least of the highest species of sentient 
beings known to man. When the want is thus satisfied in 
response to the expression of desire, we have an example of 
the efficacy of prayer as a law of sentient nature, necessary 
to the order of nature. And nothing farther than this can 
be said for any other natural law whatever. 

This law acts upon the sentient nature of man with the 
same force and to the same effect as in the case of other 
sentient beings. The human infant is dependent upon the 
mother like the young of other animals. It is necessary, 
therefore, that he should be able to express his sense of 
want, and his feeling of desire ; and that the expression 
shall reach with influential force the source of supply, and 
unlock it. The little murmur, the sharper cry, the motion 
of the lips, are suppliant signs which the mother reads 
and interprets without a teacher ; and which summon up, 
by night or by day, in sickness or health, the prompt 



PRAYER A LAW OF NATURE. 11 

response from the depths of her nature. And this act of 
suppHcation is of constant repetition and recurrence, and for 
a longer period than in the case of the young of any other 
animal. The law of prayer begins to act upon man simul- 
taneously with the feeling of infant want and desire ; and 
he proves its efficacy from the very beginning ; for God 
has made the mother to be, like Himself, a willing hearer of 
prayer. Within the department of sentient existence, there- 
fore, we perceive prayer to be an original instinct, a law of 
nature ; and that the answer to prayer is provided for in 
the same infallible way. And the bearing of this line of 
observation upon our main question is this, that prayer by 
the constitution of nature is inseparably connected with the 
relation of dependence amongst living beings. And that 
dependence, which is a law of the existence of all living 
beings, must ultimately rest upon one point of support — 
the will of Him " by whom all things consist." And to 
Him, therefore, with poetic beauty, the Scriptures represent 
the beasts and the birds as crying for their food — " Who 
provideth for the raven his food ? \\ hen his young ones 
cry unto God, they wander for lack of meat."* " The young 
lions roar after their prey, and seek their meat from God." -|* 
" He giveth to the beast his food, and to the young ravens 
which cry." I But our main concern is with man ; and let 
it be observed that there is a foundation laid in his sentient 
nature, which makes him, by the resistless necessity of 
instinct, a praying being. 

Consider man when he has passed the stage of infancy, 
when his nascent curiosity manifests the dawn of intelli- 
gence. He is now as dependent upon others for knowledge 
and wisdom as for food and care. So soon as he attains 
the first stages of the power of articulate speech, his prattle 
is a running stream of request and inquiry, ever asking and 
seeking. As he grows, his wants grow in number and 
variety, and his desires and inquiries are importunately 
addressed to all around him. This is not now merely the 
means of keeping his bodily wants before those who might 
* Job xxxviii. 41. f Ps. civ. 21. X I's. cxlvii. 9. 



12 PRAYER A LAW OF NATURE. 

not always anticipate them ; it is also the means of his 
earliest lessons in knowledge. What is this ? v/hat is that ? 
Why is this ? why is that ? How is this ? how is that ? 
His inquiries determine the order in which his first lessons 
come ; and the more clear and satisfactory and prompt he 
finds the answers to be, with all the more rapid succession 
will the inquiries come. And alas for the child whose 
ignorant parents cannot, or those who in their selfish im- 
patience will not, satisfy the ihirst of his natural curiosity 
at this early period ! When the more systematic course of 
his education has fairly commenced, it is the aim of the 
intelligent teacher to take advantage of this law to train 
it to his purpose, to direct it, and to make it the most active 
instrument of all the youth's acquisitions in wisdom and 
knowledge. Teaching would be a hopeless drudgery 
without this spirit of inquiry, and the development of the 
human intellect would be impossible. If a mother observed, 
when her child had come to a suitable age, that it never 
asked questions, never inquired the names or uses of objects, 
never asked for information, would not her sad heart tell 
her that her child was an imbecile .'' When you ask for 
information, when you open a book, you are seeking for 
the thoughts and judgments of others to help in the 
guidance of your own. The nutriment of the mind is 
secreted in the works of creation and providence, discovered 
and gathered thence by the skill and toil of many labourers, 
and deposited in the great reservoir of human literature 
from age to age, that every new generation may seek and 
search and learn, and add its own contribution to the ever- 
enlarging store. It is not now the mere instinct of sentient 
life which impels to ask. Prayer has now assumed its 
intelligent form, and manifests itself to be a law of our 
rational nature ; and the order of our rational nature is as 
dependent upon it as is the order of our sentient nature. 
To suspend its action would be to arrest the development 
of the human mind, and speedily to lose the gain of all the 
aees. The other laws which rule our mental nature would 
be inoperative without this law, so essential is its action as 



PRAYER A LAW OF NATURE. 13 

a constituent element in the life and government of thought. 
It exercises a controlling influence over the acquirement of 
knowledge, over its distribution and conservation. Prayer, 
then, belongs constitutionally to our nature, and the condi- 
tion of intellectual dependence of man upon man renders 
its action constant and imperative as any law of thought. 
It is a necessary constituent in all intellectual fellowship, 
necessary to the life of intellect. As an intelligent being, 
man is a praying being. 

Let us now consider man in society, man as a subject of 
moral order, and we shall find prayer holding a place of 
commanding influence in his social life and relations. Man 
is a social being, a being w^th a constitutional capacity for 
union with his fellows, and with a tendency to union strong 
with the resistless force of necessity. The individual cannot 
live alone ; he is not sufficient for himself Fellowship is a 
necessity of his nature. But this is to say that he is de- 
pendent upon society, and that this dependence is constant. 
He possesses a constitution, physical and mental, which 
renders personal independence, in any absolute sense, im- 
possible. His constitutional endowments are not self-acting. 
The co-factors which are necessary conditions of their 
action are supplied by their external relations. This is true 
both as regards body and mind. He is dependent upon his 
social relations for life and well-being. But those relations 
necessitate asking and receiving. Even in respect of those 
things which are necessary to bodily sustenance and support, 
they are so distributed in kind and measure that no indi- 
vidual possesses them at all times. When he rises in the 
morning, the things which he shall require throughout the 
day are in the hands of many persons as their own proper 
possession. How are they to become his ? There may be 
the condition of utter poverty, when no equivalent can be 
offered or given. In this case the only course, consistently 
with the order of society, is to appeal to the benevolence of 
the possessor — that is, to ask or beg for gratuitous relief; 
in other words, to pray. And this is the natural impulse. 
Suppose this natural law of prayer did not come into action, 



14 



PRAYER A LAW OF NATURE. 



or that it was without efficacy, the destitute must perish, or 
take by force or fraud, to the grievous disturbance of social 
order. But it is not to the condition of destitution alone 
that prayer is necessary to preserve the order of society. 
Even though you have an equivalent to give for what you 
want, that fact does not entitle you to seize upon the pro- 
perty of another, and to deposit your equivalent in its place. 
You must ask before you are entitled to receive in exchange. 
The transactions of human society could not be conducted 
without this process, nor its order maintained. The condi- 
tion of mutual dependence necessitates the observance of 
fixed and recognised laws and regulations for its right 
adjustment. There must not only be recognised rights of 
property, there must also be recognised modes and terms 
of transfer from one to another. Now whatever other terms 
and conditions may enter into the necessary transactions of 
exchange, there is ever present one indispensable condition 
— asking with a view to receive. No negociation could be 
conducted among men without this condition. Suppose 
this practice of asking suspended, as we have just supposed, 
in the case of sheer destitution ; men's wants are imperative ; 
the supplies they need are in the possession of many persons 
as their proper rights ; you may not ask, you cannot want, 
for that would violate the natural law of self-preservation. 
What, then, would be the alternative, to rich and poor alike, 
but to seize by violence or stealth whatever they needed, 
wherever it could be found. That violent aggression would 
provoke violent resistance ; and what becomes of social 
order ? What existing law of our social life could supply 
the necessary cohesive and flexible force of the repudiated 
law of prayer ? This law of social life is necessary to the 
exercise of benevolence. You cannot know or anticipate 
the special and pressing wants and troubles of others. To 
obtrude your benefactions might often be felt to be offensive, 
or your tenders of assistance insulting or mortifying. Your 
nearest neighbour may be in deep distress for help, which 
you would gladly relieve if he would make his want known ; 
and the simple statement of his case would imply supplica- 



PRAYER A LAW OF NATURE. 15 

tion. Not material wants only prompt men to request 
favours from each other ; we want counsel and consolation, 
and mental and moral support ; and we ask these favours 
from one another, and readily yield them to entreaty. 
Benevolence, not less than justice, is necessary to the order 
of society, and prayer is necessary to benevolence. And 
when we consider the place which it holds in those minor 
forms of benevolence which' pervade the intercourse of 
society in its fairest and happiest conditions, its amenities 
and courtesies, it is impossible to withhold our admiration 
of its wondrous influence. It is hke a fragrant oil that 
perfumes while it lubricates the hinges of social life. We 
entreat as a favour where we have a right to demand. We 
substitute the language of request for that of command, the 
optative for the imperative mood, greatly to the advantage 
of our social placidity. We are constantly asking gratuitous 
services from others, the most trifling assistance from their 
courtesy and good-will, in our own households, from equals, 
from inferiors, from strangers casually met — services ren- 
dered because they are asked for, and rendered in the same 
courteous spirit in which they are asked. All this is of 
constant recurrence. And prayer proves itself, in those 
forms of it, to be the ever-ready minister of kindness and 
good-will. Let anyone observe the efl"ect produced in a 
company of persons of fairly cultivated habits, when one, in 
some unsatisfied mood or momentary thoughtlessness, 
snatches what courtesy required him to request of another, 
or disregards a request made to him, and he will see how it 
jars upon the sensibilities of all, disturbing the social 
harmony. And let anyone observe the state of society 
where the absence of these forms is the rule, and not the 
exception, and he will hear harsh and imperious commands 
met with cowed or surly compliance, or defiant resistance. 
Whether, therefore, it be in great things or little, this natural 
law is essential to the harmonious action of social life. The 
numerous synonyms, with equivalent phrases, in constant 
use in human intercourse, and which occur to everyone's 
mind, show how indispensable it is to the cultivation of 



16 PRAYER IN RELATION TO OTHER NATURAL LAWS. 



a 



human fellowship. Every form of interrogation, of question 
and answer, of invitation or inquiry, by word or letter, all 
come under the same category. Social intercourse could 
not be maintained without it. 

Thus far, I think, within the natural relations of human 
life, we are entitled to say that prayer is necessary to human 
welfare, physically, intellectually, morally — nay, that it is 
necessary to the continuance of man's existence. It is an 
instinct of his sentient nature, inseparable from his intellec- 
tual and moral nature, as necessary to him as food and 
thought and conscience. It is deeply and permanently 
seated in the constitution of his nature ; and the laws of all 
nature around him are in such correspondence with it, as to 
contribute their action as a necessary element in securing 
its efficacy. To render prayer ineffectual would be a viola- 
tion of man's nature, and of the order of his correspondence 
with his environments. I believe I am warranted, from 
what has been said, in affirming that prayer is a law of 
nature, and that prayer, within the relations we have 
reviewed, does not disturb the order of nature, but is an 
element of its stability. But in order to all these beneficent 
issues, this prayer-force must possess objective efficacy. 
The value of the subjective influence depends upon the con- 
fidence entertained in the reality of the objective efficacy. 
And this confidence is a natural instinct of the human mind, 
as firm as that entertained in kindness, or justice, or any 
other bond of social life. It is an element inseparable from 
man's relation to man, kept in constant action by the neces- 
sities of his condition, and exercising a controlling influence 
in his schemes of life and conduct. In his intellectual life, 
in his moral and social life and relations, man is, by his 
mental and moral constitution, a praying being. 

III. — Prayer in Relation to other Natural Laws. 

Still confining ourselves to the sphere of the natural 
relations, we have next to inquire whether prayer exercises 
any modifying or controlling influence over the actio7t of other 
natural laws. The order of nature, it is well known, is 



PRAYER IN RELATION TO OTHER NATURAL LAWS. 17 

maintained, not by each law acting out its own proper 
tendency to its own proper results, by its own inexorable 
and inflexible force, but by having its own proper action 
modified by the action of other laws ruling within the same 
sphere. No one of them possesses despotic sway. We 
have the most conspicuous and grandest instance of the 
reciprocal control of natural laws in those of gravitation 
and motion. These laws meet on the great arena of the 
planetary and stellar worlds, like gigantic athletes, contend- 
ing, amongst other prizes, for mastery over this fair earth 
of ours. Should the law of gravitation prove the victor, 
our world would be precipitated upon the surface of the 
sun, to the great disturbance of the present order of nature. 
Should the first law of motion prevail, our earth must rush 
from her orbit, and be eventually dashed against some other 
world, equally to the disturbance of the order of nature. 
But the well-matched force of these great wrestlers compels 
a compromise ; and because neither is inflexible, but each 
controlled by the other, our planet is borne in stately equi- 
poise in her magnificent orbit, to the well-being of her 
teeming population, and to the conservation of the order of 
nature. If, then, prayer may be found to exercise, in any 
measure, a modifying influence upon the action of other 
laws, and be in turn modified or limited in its action by 
them, it would be in accordance with the order of nature, 
and not a violation of it. Let us instance the physiological 
laws. The cry of the hungry infant, inarticulate though it 
be, is rightly interpreted by the maternal instinct as a 
prayer for the bland nutriment secreted in her frame. The 
natural force of that natural prayer stirs into activity a 
whole cycle of physiological function in the bosom of the 
mother, and immediately after, as by a reflex action, in the 
frame of the infant. Suppose no direct efTect followed from 
the infantile prayer, what would be the effect upon the 
nutrition of childhood ? But not in infancy only, and in 
maternity, are such effects produced by the natural power 
of prayer. Very strong emotions may be excited by re- 
quests, by urgent and importunate solicitations, painfully 
B 



18 PRAYER IN RELATION TO OTHER NATURAL LAWS. 

unwelcome. And the emotions thus excited will stimulate 
physiological action. Professor Bain says, " It may be 
doubted if any considerable emotion passes over us without 
telling upon the processes of digestion, either to quicken or 
depress them. All the depressing and perturbing passions 
are known to take away appetite, to arrest the healthy 
action of the stomach, liver, bowels, &c. A hilarious excite- 
ment stimulates those functions." All these effects may be 
produced by asking questions. It will stir passion, love or 
resentment, desire or indignation; and the responsive emo- 
tion proves the force of prayer. 

Prayer in the natural relations is necessary to man's 
control over matter, and to his dominion over the earth. 
Mind rules over matter through the organism of the human 
body. The body is the only portion of matter over which 
the mind's executive power, the will, acts with direct and 
immediate effect. The mind, in ruling the body and con- 
trolling its motions, is ruling over matter, and modifying 
the action of its laws. There are two forces in existence 
which successfully assert their superiority to matter, by their 
power of resisting and controlling the force of its laws — 
life and mind. The living vegetable organism possesses 
the power of assimilating mineral substances, changing 
their forms, imparting new qualities, and employing them 
in new functions, wholly alien to their nature and laws, 
under their original forms. The tiny sporule of the moss, 
a microscopic speck, is endowed with this potency. The 
grass, the flowers, the stately trees, are the mineral sub- 
stances of the earth, wrested from the grasp of material 
laws, transformed and organised by the power of life. The 
meanest thing that crawls, by that very motion proves its 
superiority to the law of gravity. The stone offers no 
resistance, but lies immovable, passive in the power of that 
mighty law. It cannot exercise the same absolute force over 
the insect ; the insect has life. A living man disputes the force 
of gravitation by his power of free, voluntary locomotion. 
In the morning, in fresh vigour, with elastic step, he spurns 
the heath and breasts the hill, knowing that he has entered 



PRAYER IN RELATION TO OTHER NATURAL LAWS. 19 

into conflict with this mighty force. As the sun declines, 
he is conscious that the material law is gaining upon him. 
By the evening he drags his limbs wearily. As the vital 
force abates, the physical force gains, and by night he yields 
the struggle, laid passive on his couch. But he is not con- 
quered. He has been visited by " tired nature's sweet 
restorer, balmy sleep," and he renews the contest with the 
morning light ; and he wages this war from day to day, 
from year to year, until life's tired servants, worn out with 
the weary conflict, crumble amongst the clods of the valley, 
and gravitation is the conqueror. No ; not the conqueror 
of life ! Life has defied it ever. And its seeming conquest 
is not final. Another morn shall come ; and the body 
which has obeyed the Divine law of gravitation, and has 
been rested in obeying, shall rise, unimpeded by its force, 
" to meet the Lord in the air." Life is superior to matter. 

And mind is superior to mere sentient life, and therefore 
superior to mere physical force. Man is able to interfere 
with the order of nature within certain limits, and is obliged 
to do so for his own well-being, even for the preservation of 
his life. This is a very obvious fact in respect of the food 
by which he is nourished. The plants upon which he so 
much depends are not provided, in the order of nature, in 
the form adapted to his natural constitution. By our pro- 
cesses of cultivation we interfere with the natural order of 
their production, and change their qualities, replacing those 
which, in their natural state, are injurious, by qualities which 
are nutritious and healthful. It is an interference with the 
order of physical nature to disturb the surface of the earth by 
spade or plough. It is the order of nature that plants shall 
bud and grow and decline and die. It is not in the order 
of their nature to have their processes violently arrested, 
and destruction to visit them in the freshness of their young 
beauty, or in the maturity of their prolific fertility. Yet 
wherever man rules, he disturbs the order of vegetable life 
to promote the order of his own. In a similar manner does 
he deal with animal life. Animals are not provided in the 
order of nature in a condition to satisfy his appetite or 



20 PRAYER IN RELATION TO OTHER NATURAL LAWS. 

nourish his life. Man cannot be nourished otherwise than 
by organic matter ; yet not while it lives, but after it has 
been put to death. What more firmly established order in 
nature is there than the law of animal as well as of vegetable 
life — that it develop from the germ, grow and mature, re- 
produce its kind, and decline and die .'' And what more sig- 
nal instance of interference with the order of nature can be 
imagined than to lay violent and instant arrest upon any 
given life, at any stage of its development, by a single voli- 
tion of man, human life itself not excepted ? And this takes 
place in the highest department of natural order and of 
natural law. And this interference with the order of life is 
practised on a still larger scale amongst the lower animals, 
in one kind preying upon another, one class in conflict with 
another ; the order of nature in one class interfering with 
the order of nature w^hich obtains in another, that the 
general order of nature may be preseved. Every death by 
violence, every premature death, is a violation of the order 
of nature. That children die before their parents is a vio- 
lation of the order of nature. Man, by his mental power, 
is able to subject the order of nature to his own purposes, 
within the limits of his own interests. But as the only 
portion of matter subject to the direct volition of his own 
mind is his own body, with a very limited portion in contact 
with his body, the power of the individual over matter is too 
limited to serve fully his own interests. I may want a book 
which is now in London or New York, but it will not obey 
my volition ; but a request, addressed to a person in either 
place by letter or by the electric telegraph, will place it in 
my possession. Prayer, as a natural law, is essential to the 
formation and maintenance of such combinations of men as 
are necessary to man's dominion over the earth. Prayer 
has power to prevail with other minds, to bring their bodies 
to act upon matter beyond my reach, and to transport it 
for my service wherever I desire. I have acted upon it by 
prayer, and so moved other wills and other hands to accom- 
plish my desire. Whatever other influences may be brought 
into action, asking is ever a necessary element to secure co- 



LIMITATION OF THE EFFICACY OF PRAYER. 21 

operative labour. It is thus the busy work of human life 
goes on. Streams of urgent petitions are flowing in from 
man to his fellows, streams of ready answers ever flowing 
back ; mutual help and support maintain social order and 
action, and man makes good his dominion over the earth. 

It is surely a significant fact that God, in His government 
of the inter-relations of mankind, and in His government 
of man's relations with the material world, has made prayer 
to be a law of His government, of necessary and constant 
action, indispensable as a vital, mental, and moral force, to 
the stability of this economy, and to the facile and har- 
monious adjustment and action of its parts, Man is by 
nature a praying being. 

IV. — Limitation of the Efficacy of Prayer. 

Within those limits, then, within which prayer acts, is it 
of invariable efficacy? Does the desired answer follow so 
necessarily upon the petition, and in terms of the petition, 
that it may be counted upon with entire certainty .'* No, 
Both the asking and the answering are subject to limitation 
by the action of other laws. It is like all other natural 
laws in this respect In our human relations, if prayer were 
of invariable efficacy, it would be destructive of social order. 
If a man were compelled, by the inexorable efficacy of 
prayer, to give to every petitioner whatever he chose to 
ask — his property, his labour, his time — he would speedily 
be despoiled of his liberty and means of life, and be driven, 
in his turn, to despoil others by his importunate entreaties. 
For the safety of society, there are certain natural as well 
as moral and conventional restraints placed upon asking in 
the intercourse of human life. Our deliberate reason and 
our common sense impose a limit upon the expectations we 
form from others, and upon the desires which we address to 
them. And there is a corresponding limit to granting 
petitions on the same grounds of reason and common sense. 
The law of conscience, the sense of propriety, our self- 
respect, forbid our seeking favours from others, or benefits 
and advantages, which our own efforts may achieve for 



22 LIMITATION OF THE EFFICACY OF PRAYER. 

ourselves. And a man's prudence and sense of right may 
constrain him to refuse a petition, having a better know- 
ledge of his means and resource, and of the prior obligations 
resting upon him, than the petitioner. And petitions may- 
be refused on public grounds by those who dispense the 
patronage of empires. And very many petitions are rejected 
by the very categoric and decisive conclusion, " I will not." 
Your pleadings may address a man's reason, his benevo- 
lence, or his conscience ; you may use all importunity, and 
bring all influences to bear upon him, to move him to will 
as you desire; but his will is the court of last resort, and is 
entitled to determine the issue of your request. It is 
obvious that if will did not impose a restraining force upon 
the efficacy of prayer, no man's liberty of action would be 
secure. That prayer possess efficacy is essential to its 
proper nature, but unlimited efficacy would be destructive. 
It is equally essential to the order of nature that prayer be 
efficacious, and that its efficacy be limited. And this is a 
characteristic of all natural laws. 

We have now seen, by a sufficient induction, that prayer 
is natural to man, an original element in his constitution ; 
that he is placed under conditions of life which necessitate 
its habitual exercise, and that he is thus trained from his 
infancy to be a praying being. We have seen that its 
exercise is necessary to the existence and well-being of 
human society ; and therefore it is a constituent element of 
the Divine moral government over the human race. In 
truth, it is quite evident that no moral government would 
be suited to man, or could take effect upon his social rela- 
tions, which did not make account of this principle and 
recognise its action. It is inseparable from his intelligent 
and moral nature ; and he is incapable of sustaining rela- 
tions with any intelligent being from which prayer, as an 
element of fellowship, were necessarily excluded. 



PRAYER IN THE SPIRITUAL RELATION. 23 

V. — Prayer in the Spiritual Relation. 

I have considered it necessary, by all this line of observa- 
tion, to show that there is a foundation in nature to render 
it Jfrima facie proh3.hlQ th.a.t God recognises the efficacy of 
prayer in man's relation with Himself; that as surely as He 
has designed him for a life of dependence upon Himself, so 
surely has He designed him for a life of prayer, and has 
provided that the conditions of its exercise shall never be 
wanting. And we are now sufficiently familiar with the 
natural operation and efficacy of prayer to be prepared, in 
some measure, to illustrate its place and power in the 
spiritual sphere. " That was not first which is spiritual, but 
that which is natural, and afterward that which is spiritual." • 
In point of fact, we have no new principle to deal with when 
we come to consider our relation with God. We carry with 
us into the spiritual relation the same powers of mind, the 
same constitutional tendencies, the same moral faculty, the 
same affections, which are in constant action in the natural 
sphere. And the spiritual relation is maintained concur- 
rently with the natural, and without confusion to either ; 
because the same natural powers consciously act in the 
same natural way when the spiritual is superadded to the 
natural. And our relation with God is conducted, both on 
His part and ours, on the same moral principles which rule 
the inter-relations of mankind. No other classes of such 
principles are known to us, or could be known by us, unless 
there were imparted to our nature corresponding faculties. 
Justice, goodness, and truth are determining principles of 
God's conduct towards man. These same principles He 
has implanted in the constitution of man, and they are the 
principles which of necessity rule all his moral relations, 
human and Divine. Our relation with God is a personal 
relation, involving the reciprocation of personal feeling, the 
interchange of thought, intelligent fellowship, benefaction 
on the one side, veneration, trust, gratitude on the other. 
Justice, goodness, and truth are sufficient for all moral 
relations. Our relation with God involves the condition of 



24 PRAYER IN THE SPIRITUAL RELATION. 

dependence on our part, with every experience incident to 
dependence. Every dependent being is subject to want. 
The feeling of want excites the desire for reHef, and the 
desire is naturally directed to the known source of supply. 
All this applies to our relation with God, and with similar 
effect, as in the analogous case of our relations with man. 
We must, therefore, have respect to the laws of giving and 
receiving. Now the law implanted in our nature, and 
coming into thought whenever the sense of dependence and 
the feeling of want arise, is, "Ask, and it shall be given you," 
And the impulse of suffering nature is to pray. I know 
there is to be found in many such an insensibility to God's 
right to His own, that they violate all righteousness in their 
treatment of what is His, laying hands upon it, appro- 
priating it without leave asked, and withholding it from the 
Divine service; just as there are many who have lost all 
sensibility to the distinction between mine and thine, and 
freely appropriate their neighbour's goods. Every one who 
believes in God the Creator of all things, believes also that 
He is the Sovereign Proprietor of all, and that all is at His 
sovereign disposal, to give or to withhold. Now we know 
that "ask, and it shall be given you" is a law of His moral 
government, as authoritative as any other moral law im- 
planted in our nature. We are dependent beings, and our 
nature is constitutionally adapted to a condition of depen- 
dence-; and nothing in our nature can suggest to us the 
possibility of becoming independent — that is, of possessing 
within ourselves all the sources of our life and well-being 
and perfection. That prayer shall for ever constitute an 
essential element in conducting our relation of dependence 
upon God, is a conclusion absolutely necessary from the 
nature of the case. But prayer implies answer as its 
necessary correlative. The natural disposition to ask is 
inseparable from our dependent nature, and is itself a proof 
of the existence of a corresponding disposition to answer ; 
otherwise our nature would deceive us, prompting us to 
fruitless effort. Every thoughtful man contemplates with 
admiration the correspondences between the nature of man. 



- 



PRAYER IN THE SPIRITUAL RELATION. 25 

mental and physical, and the nature that surrounds him. 
There are suitable objects for the perception of all the 
senses. For every desire of our nature there are appro- 
priate objects ; for every affection, and for every faculty of 
the mind, the necessary conditions of their action are freely 
provided. Now prayer engages in its exercise our intel- 
lectual and moral powers, our will and emotions, prompted 
by our want and desire; and it is unphilosophical to suppose 
that no response is possible. It would be contrary to 
the whole course of nature. Dependence implies support. 
A dependent being implies a supporting Being. Want implies 
fulness ; human want, Divine fulness ; huinan dependence, a 
Divine supporter ; human prayer. Divine response. The 
native intuitions of man apprehend these pairs of relations 
simultaneously. Besides, it is rational to believe that the 
exercise of our powers in our human relations is designed 
to fit them for the cultivation of our relations with God. 
" That was not first which is spiritual, but that which is 
natural, and afterward that which is spiritual." Every 
mental and moral exercise which is necessary to the social 
order of human life is necessary to the cultivation of our 
fellowship with God. Every affection which binds us to 
man is designed to rest upon God as its supreme object. 
We are dependent upon our relation to Him for the 
highest, for the only satisfying object of every mental 
and moral power we possess, and for every affection 
of our heart. Our dependence upon man is partial only, 
and it is only in a partial measure he can yield us 
support and satisfaction. Our dependence upon God is 
total, and all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge, and 
all the fulness of the earth, are His, and His dominion ex- 
tendeth over all. He can support us, and satisfy every want 
and every desire to the uttermost. We ask of man for the 
measure of help he can render, and he responds to our 
asking ; and our asking and his response are alike natural 
tendencies, inseparable from the nature of our relations with 
each other. I ask. Is it rational to believe that while God 
has made it obligatory, by the very constitution of our 



26 PRAYER IN THE SPIRITUAL RELATION. 

nature, that we should respond to one another's petitions 
yet that He Himself, by a rigid system of ordinances, which 
we denominate "the course and constitution of nature," has 
rendered prayer to Him wholly without efficacy? This would 
be to destroy the correspondences between external nature 
and the nature within us. In our felt dependence and want, 
the law of our nature prompts us to pray to Him upon whom 
we depend ; but it is alleged that the laws of material nature 
oppose all response. Even Mr. Spencer regards external 
nature as a manifestation of his First Cause ; but the hypo- 
thesis of fruitless prayer would interpose the order of nature 
to hide God from our view, and, indeed, to make it of no 
consequence to us whatever, whether there be a God or no. 
In truth, the hypothesis is altogether atheistical. A being 
that could not answer prayer, from whatever cause, could be 
no object of trust, nor of love, nor of reverence. We could 
have no ennobling intercourse with him, no loving, holy 
fellowship. We would be confined to the low level of our 
fallen humanity for our fellowships, and men in their best 
state are too nearly on a level with each other for one to 
bear his fellows upward to the perfection prophesied by the 
possibilities of our nature. We need for this habitual fel- 
lowship with a perfection above us — to help, to allure, to 
guide us onward. It is the belief of the supernatural which 
has been the basis and spring, and which continues to be 
the living support of our civilisation, and that because of 
being the root and support of our moral life. But this 
belief is not in the supernatural as an abstraction, but as a 
personal God. And even this would be ineffectual to elevate 
man's life, without the belief that personal intercourse with 
Him was a possible privilege, open to the enjoyment of 
every one who will. And in conducting this intercourse 
with God, there is a special suitableness in prayer, because 
it is the expression of our dependence. It is therefore, at 
the same time, an expression of our homage to God as 
Sovereign Lord and Proprietor of all things, the only source 
of all power and wisdom and goodness. It is an expression 
of our trust and confidence in Him. But then the question 



PRAYER IN THE SPIRITUAL RELATION. 27 

may arise — All this is natural on the human side, but what 
of the Divine ? Has God given any intimation of His 
willingness to communicate with man, in such form that 
man can certainly interpret it ? Is there any medium of 
communication ? Yes, in nature ; for our argument does 
not, at this stage, admit of reference to the inspired Word. 
Nature, as the work of God, is a communication from God 
to man, a vast system of significant symbols, symbols of 
Divine thought addressed to the human senses, and intel- 
ligible to the human understanding. It is here that man 
finds the treasury from which he stores his own mind with 
all the opulence of thought. What are these terms so 
familiar to our minds — law^ order, proportion, fitness, design, 
adaptation, means and ends, equality and inequality, force, 
equilibrium, cause and effect, beauty, sublimity ? They are 
thoughts, conclusions of mind. Whence do we derive them ? 
They are not original creations of man. He finds them 
in nature. They obtrude themselves upon him ; he learns 
them and appropriates them. Let him treat them rever- 
ently, they are Divine thoughts ; they have their source in 
the mind of God. Then man himself belongs to nature, and 
he finds in himself another class of Divine thoughts, richer 
and more precious still — ^justice, goodness* truth, holiness, 
love ; and these, he rightly infers, pre-existed in God Him- 
self, attributes of His nature ; and man exults in the con- 
sciousness, that as he can read Divine thoughts in their 
symbols and make them his own, his mind bears affinity to 
the Divine, and is capable of fellowship with God. Realis- 
ing this relation to God, and " God's conversibleness with 
man," prayer becomes as natural and as necessary as to 
breathe. And it is not until sin has made man ti7matural, 
that any controversy could have arisen upon the subject. 
That God cares for man is abundantly evident in the pro- 
vision made for the continuance and well-being of the race, 
and in the way in which He has subordinated nature to Hi^ 
will and use. And let it be kept in mind that I address 
myself only to those who believe that there is a God who is 
the Creator and Lord of all ; for only on that assumption is 



28 PRAYER IN THE SPIRITUAL RELATION. 

there any ground for discussing the subject of prayer at all. 
By the very fact that He has brought us into existence, He 
has brought us into relation with Himself; and thereby 
also intimates His will that we shall have intercourse with 
Him. And by making us dependent upon Himself, He 
has made it a necessity of our condition that we should 
"feel after Him, if haply we may find Him, though He be 
not far from every one of us." God thus manifests, in the 
symbols of nature, the power and the will to hold converse 
with man. But that converse can only be conducted on the 
part of man by the use of his natural powers. His desires 
are inseparable from his nature, and the expression of his 
desires is as natural as the desires themselves. The sources 
and means of their satisfaction are external to themselves. 
No desire contains the object of its satisfaction within itself. 
It must seek for it outside of self; and it seeks that it may 
find, it asks that it may receive. Prayer is attached to 
desire by necessity of nature as surely as desire springs 
from want. If man recognises his dependence upon God, 
he will be conscious of wants in his life's experiences which 
neither man nor nature can supply. Intense desire will be 
born of urgent need, and will prompt importunate entreaty. 
This is the order of human nature. Has God made the 
order of external nature to be antagonistic to the order of 
human ? Is the constitutional tendency to prayer, of which 
man is conscious, made to be abortive when the urgencies 
of human need are the sorest ? Is prayer a bond of union 
between man and man, and a necessary means of mental 
and moral advancement .'* And can it serve no similar pur- 
pose to man in his relation with God ? The elevation and 
refinement of his mental and moral nature depends upon 
intercourse with God; and he has been trained to prayer, 
that he may instinctively feel that the end of that training 
is prayer to God. 



THE LAWS OF MATTER AND OF PRAYER. 29 

VI. — Are the Laws of Matter Antagonistic to 
THE Law of Prayer ? 

I believe the considerations thus adduced are quite suffi- 
cient to prove that prayer is a necessity of our nature in 
conducting our relations with God ; that God is Himself 
the Author of that necessity ; that it is a law of our nature 
and of our relation to Him. Are the laws of matter, then, 
antagonistic to this law } and is their power sufficient to 
nullify its action ? This is the averment of modern science. 
There are surely strong presumptions against this conclu- 
sion. He that ordained all these laws must have designed 
them all to be effectual for their end ; and His power and 
wisdom are sufficient guarantee that they should not be 
mutually destructive, neither that one should be destroyed 
and the other survive. And surely, least of all, the presump- 
tion is, that the law which affects the highest interests of 
man should give place to the laws which maintain the order 
of the material world. In point of fact, we see and expe- 
rience that the interests of man are the superior interests in 
the world ; that all animal life, if it endangers his interests, 
may be destroyed. Now animal life is more valuable than 
dead matter, as it serves a higher purpose in the economy 
of God. We may, I think, conclude that, a fortiori^ if 
matter and its forces were found in the way, impeding the 
mental and moral progress of man, there would be found in 
the infinite resources of the Sovereign Ruler the means of 
effectual counteraction. But as the laws of matter and the 
law of prayer meet on the plane of human life and of human 
interests, I believe the rational conclusion to be, that they 
all, under Divine control, work together for good. It is 
surely possible to believe that prayer and the physical laws 
were pre-ordained, with their mutual adjustment, in the 
original design of the great economy ; so that, when they 
met on the same plane, they would, like the physical laws 
amongst themselves, act and re-act upon each other, to the 
stability and harmony of the order of all departments of 
nature. And it is surely manifest that in the adjustment of 



30 THE LAWS OF MATTER AND OF PRAYER. 

the economy of the world every element must be taken into 
account. Human wants, human desires, human affections, 
and the human will, would find a place and occasion for 
their action. Now we know and feel that these experiences 
of mankind are indefinite in their variations — varying in 
their objects, varying in their intensity, varying in the con- 
ditions of their actions. Does the economy not provide for 
these variations ? Are these variations less to be considered 
than the variations of the atmosphere .'' Are the ever- 
shifting forms of its clouds, the flashes of its lightning, the 
roll of its thunder — the changes of temperature, from that of 
the frozen north to that of the torrid zone — the changes, 
through all degrees of its motion, from the gentlest zephyr 
that fans the cheek to the tornado that roots up forests, 
that overthrows cities, and wrecks proud navies — of more 
account than all the diversified experiences of human souls ? 
Our experience teaches us that there is a place for the play 
of the human will in the order of nature. Mr. Huxley says 
that "our volition counts for something in the course of 
events." It is necessary to our life and mental progress 
that within the limits of our interests the course of nature 
shall obey the control of our wills. The course of nature 
does not supply food in a condition fit for human nourish- 
ment. It does not provide clothing ready for use. It does 
not hew blocks from the mountain, nor transport them to 
the site you have chosen for a house, nor will it by its 
natural action construct it and prepare it for your habita- 
tion. You might perish in the midst of the opulence of 
nature if your own volitions did not count for something in 
the course of events. Nature produces the materials, but 
you must transform them by the agency of your own hands, 
under the direction of your own designing mind, and im- 
pelled and controlled by the determinations of your will. 
But in order to the desired results, it is absolutely necessary 
that the forces of nature shall, within the limits required by 
human well-being, obey the human will. It is by directing 
the forces of nature man stores up light in the form of gas ; 
imprisons the mighty force of steam, graduates its action. 



THE LAWS OF MATTER AND OF PRAYER. 31 

and compels it to perform his will and do his work ; and 
by the control of his will he guides the force of electricity 
through thousands of miles to any spot on the earth, and 
there compels it to utter his mind and express his desires. 
By this control he is transforming the face of the earth, and 
subjecting it to his dominion. The superiority of man over 
all else that belongs to earth, the importance of his interests 
above all other earthly interests, his mind, his will, his 
conscience — all proclaim his superiority to all materialism, 
that it is not his master, and that its order is subordinated 
to him and his interests. Truly, " his volition counts for 
something in the course of events." 

But it would seem rational to suppose that there is also 
some place for the volitions of the Divine will, and that they 
too would tell for something in the course of events. This, 
however, is denied by some who believe that God, having 
set the mechanism of the material universe in motion, leaves 
it to the automatic action of the laws impressed upon it ; 
and that these laws are so fixed and invariable that no 
interference is possible, and that the Divine will no longer 
acts within the sphere of matter so as to interfere with its 
action ; and that, therefore, God cannot answer prayer for 
physical changes. Now this might be granted on one 
assumption — namely, that the physical universe was to be 
regarded simply in itself But this is not the view in which 
alone it is to be regarded. It is the abode of intelligent 
beings, with free wills, capable of being influenced by the 
materialism, because partaking of its nature and qualities ; 
and therefore also capable of re-acting upon it. The element 
of will is thus introduced into the materialism, acting upon 
it, and yet not a law of it ; influencing its order, and yet 
not of its order. In man's connection with it, it is a neces- 
sary means of his mental discipline and training. It contains 
stores of knowledge, courting his research and investigation, 
affording constant exercise for the powers of his mind, and 
therefore for their continual improvement. Besides, the 
human body exercises a very important influence in the 
moral training of mankind. Its susceptibility of pleasure or 



32 THE LAWS OF MATTER AND OF PRAYER. 

pain forms a test of moral power and of moral principle. 
The bodily wants, deriving their supplies from the organic 
and inorganic matter of the earth, — property, that is, the 
means of bodily sustenance and support as a rights becomes 
a necessity of the individual. And the acquisition and use 
of property become very important elements in the moral 
training and discipline of the race. When the material 
world is regarded thus, as acted upon by free wills through 
a material organism, and that it is thus brought into relation 
with -life and mind and morals, and as having an influence 
through its laws upon man's life and character and expe- 
rience, physical, mental, and moral, — I think there is good 
reason to believe that a God showing so much interest in 
man's welfare will not abandon His immediate control of a 
world and its laws freighted with such interests ; but when- 
ever the occasion arises in the lives of His worshippers 
needing His interposition, His will shall prove a power to 
determine controversies between man and matter. We 
cannot but believe that in all His works God had moral 
ends supremely in view. His greatest, His noblest work 
is a race of mortal beings. They are created in His image, 
and are His special care ; and we may very well believe that 
when they specially need physical help which the order of 
nature does not supply, He will modify that order for their 
relief, and yet the universe shall never feel a shock. May 
not God act upon matter in ways unknown to us } Men of 
science do not claim to have discovered all the properties 
of matter. Dr. Tyndall says he has not even a theory of 
magnetism. Do they not often observe phenomena to 
which they cannot assign a cause .'' The laws of nature 
obey the human will, within circumscribed limits indeed, 
yet sufficiently for man's need. They are surely as pliant to 
the will of God. And because of the ineradicable tendency 
to pray, under a sense of dependence and of obligation, 
whenever God is recognised, we may undoubtingly infer 
that this law of our nature shall be as effectual, within the 
conditions of its action, in attaining its end as any law of 
matter. Not only so, but as mind is superior to matter, 



HOW DOES GOD ANSWER PRAYER? 33 

and the interests of mind of more value than the order of 
material nature, we may rationally infer that if conflicting 
claims shall arise between them, the order of nature shall 
not prevail against the interests of man. Those who believe 
miracles to be historical facts, have satisfying proof that 
no order of material nature shall be allowed to stand in the 
way when moral interests are to be advanced. And one 
end served by miracles undoubtedly is, that it may be 
demonstrated to man that God is present in nature, and 
exercises power over all its laws, whether in the line of 
their natural order or against them ; that from this also 
man may be assured that the order of nature presents no 
obstacle to the efficacy of prayer. 

VII. — How DOES God Answer Prayer ? 

Still the question is pressed. How does God answer 
prayer ? Is it by interfering with the order of nature, by 
suspending the action of its laws, or by compelling them to 
a course of action contrary to their nature ? That prayer 
is not answered by disturbance of the order of nature, the 
continuance of the order of nature through the historical 
period, and its continuance by the testimony of all men's 
senses to-day, is sufficient to prove ; men have been praying 
through all that period, and from generation to generation 
have believed that their prayers were answered in the forms 
of material good as well as spiritual ; and yet the ordinances 
of nature bear no trace of change. And in this present 
generation, and at this day, multitudes assemble, not only 
from Sabbath to Sabbath, but also from day to day, besides 
in secret and in the family, with earnest and importunate 
petitions for every form of temporal and spiritual blessings 
for themselves and others; still the order of nature proceeds 
in grand procession undisturbed. The praying people, there- 
fore, are not looking for disturbance in the order of nature. 
The presumption, then, is that the answer comes in the 
order of nature, and by the silent ministry of its laws. 
When I ask for my daily bread, I expect it to come, and I 

find it docs come, through the ever-recurring ordinances of 
C 



34 HOW DOES GOD ANSWER PRAYER? 

seed-time and harvest, as the fruit of forethought and skill 
and toil of man. For it is manifest that God, in making 
prayer to be a law of man's nature, designed it to act with 
the constancy of a law, neither fitfully nor at stated seasons, 
nor on special occasions only, but that it shall be habitual 
and persistent as our dependent condition is ; and that we 
shall have the confidence in its efficacy of operation and 
fruitfulness of result, according to its proper nature, which 
we entertain in every ordinance of nature. 

But if it is thus the answer comes, how can it be distin- 
guished from the action of natural law ? If the two things 
are strictly coincident in their course of action and result, 
is there any test by which the share of the result contributed 
by prayer may be marked off from that produced by human 
labour, by rain and sunshine. This is the demand of the 
men of science. They say every physical effect is suscep- 
tible of scientific verification. But it is quite evident that, if 
the physical answer to prayer were observable, it would 
require no scientific process to verify it. All men's obser- 
vation would verify it, and neither doubt nor controversy 
could arise upon the subject. But as it does not, as a rule, 
submit itself to common observation, I think good reason 
can be shown why it cannot be detected by any scientific 
process. Dr. Tyndall represents prayer as an appeal to a 
Power, "under pressing circumstances," which "produces the 
precise effects caused by physical energy in the ordinary 
course of things." " Forced," he says, " upon his attention 
as a form of physical energy, or as the equivalent of such 
energy, he claims the right of subjecting it to those methods 
of examination from which all our present knowledge of the 
physical universe is derived." It may be observed respect- 
ing these statements, first, that prayer is not confined to 
"pressing circumstances," for Christians not only pray for 
their daily bread, which they expect to come under ordinary 
circumstances, but when it is on their table, they pray that 
the Divine Giver may bless it — that is, that by some energy 
competent to Himself alone. He may give the full designed 
and desired effect to the conditions of nutrition which He 



^ 



HOW DOES GOD ANSWER PRAYER? 35 

Himself has ordained. Our dependence knows no intervals 
and no exceptions ; and we seek that our prayers shall 
cover the whole extent of our dependence. When, therefore, 
we ask our food to be blessed to us, we do not know in 
what manner the Divine energy may influence the "physical 
energy" to the desired result. Even "pressing circum- 
stances" may be met and adjusted according to our desire, 
by means whose natural adaptation we shall recognise in 
the welcome result ; yet not the less shall we ascribe the 
issue to the interposition of Divine energy. But, again, 
observe the remarkable expression in the sentence I have 
quoted from Dr. Tyndall — "A form of physical energy, or 
the equivalent of such energy." What does Dr. Tyndall 
mean by "an equivalent of physical energy".-^ It can only 
mean an energy not physical, yet capable of producing 
physical effects. But such an energy would not submit 
itself to his " methods of examination." We would regard 
a Divine volition to be such an energy ; nay, more than an 
equivalent for physical energy, as being the cause of physical 
energy, its efficient cause. And, strange as it may seem, 
Dr. Tyndall appears to acknowledge the reasonableness of 
supposing such a non-physical energy acting upon physical 
phenomena. After saying that " he contends only for the 
displacement of prayer, not for its extinction," and that 
''physical nature is not its legitimate domain," he adds the 
following beautiful passage : — " The theory that the system 
of nature is under the control of a Being who changes 
phenomena in compliance with the prayers of men, is, in my 
opinion, a perfectly legitimate one. It may of course be 
rendered futile by being associated with conceptions which 
contradict it ; but such conceptions form no necessary part 
of the theory. It is a matter of experience that an earthly 
father, who is at the same time wise and tender, listens to 
the requests of his children, and, if they do not ask amiss, 
takes pleasure in granting their requests. We know, also, 
that this compliance extends to the alteration, within cer- 
tain limits, of the current of events on earth. With this 
suggestion offered by our experience, it is no departure 



36 HOW DOES GOD ANSWER PRAYER? 

from scientific method to place behind natural phenomena 
a universal Father, who, in answer to the prayers of His 
children, alters the currents of those phenomena."* Dr. 
Tyndall has here conceded the legitimacy of our position — a 
universal Father altering the currents of natural phenomena 
in answer to the prayers of His children. It may be 
legitimately asked how he would discover, by his scientific 
method of examination, the action of the universal Father 
in the altered phenomena, and show the share contributed 
by His agency as distinct from that contributed by the 
physical forces ^ The alteration of phenomena is a physical 
effect ; will analysis of it disclose the distinction ^ One 
observes with pain that Dr. Tyndall does not adopt the 
theory which he states with some nice feeling ; but he 
acknowledges its scientific legitimacy. By this acknow- 
ledgment Dr. Tyndall bars the claim he had just advanced 
to "the right of subjecting prayer to those methods of 
examination from which all of our present knowledge of 
the physical universe is derived ;" or he must confess that 
he is bound by his hypothesis to take his place by the side 
of the believers in prayer ; for that hypothesis, which he 
affirms to be legitimate, is the Theist's theory of prayer. It 
is wholly inconsistent with his views of prayer as its most 
conspicuous opponent. But the claim he makes to subject 
the alleged physical effects of prayer to the test of physical 
analysis is not merely unreasonable ; it is irrational. Dr 
Tyndall, with his unsurpassed skill in physical analysis, is 
not able, in every experiment, to appropriate to each phy- 
sical force its own proper share in every physical effect. I 
present for his analysis a grain of wheat. I ask him to 
separate by actual experiment, with scientific accuracy, and 
to label the several parts of that physical effect respectively 
due to the several ingredients in the soil, to the several 
elements of the atmosphere — to light, to heat, to electricity, 
and other forces exhaustively. And as the grain of wheat 
is a cultivated product, he is required to show in the 
analysis the exact portion due to the human will. 

* " Contemporar)' Review,'' Oct., 1872. 



HOW DOES GOD ANSWER PRAYER? 37 

This demand is the parallel to that of Dr. Tyndall him- 
self. He claims that if there be real efficacy in prayer, it 
should discover itself in a physical analysis of its effect, as 
distinct from the forces of nature. The answer to prayer 
is from the will of God. The will of man combines with 
the order of nature in the production of the grain of wheat. 
Let him show the effect of human volition as a distinctly 
recognisable element. He will then have a more plausible 
claim to demand that the will of God, in answer to prayer, 
shall discover itself in the crucible of physical analysis. 
Now we hold that the prayer-force is an efficient agent in 
the production of the grain of wheat, acting with and by 
every other force ; not because we can separate its effect 
from that of the other forces, but because, on the theory of 
prayer, its influence is present everywhere, wherever human 
interests extend. Its range of action is co-extensive with 
the human race ; it pervades all human interests of every 
kind, and connects itself with everything by which human 
interests may be effected. When we pray for the success 
of our sowing, there is comprehended under that prayer the 
full natural efficiency of every force which contributes to 
the germination of the seed, to its growth, to its maturity 
and its ingathering, together with the skill and labour of 
man. Prayer is persistent as any other law ; it never ceases. 
There never has been wanting a praying people on the 
earth ; and their prayers are for all men. And because the 
order of nature affects man's condition — his health, his com- 
fort, his prosperity — prayer acts upon the processes of nature 
by its efficacy with God. And Dr. Tyndall assures us that 
" it is no departure from scientific method to place behind 
natural phenomena a universal Father, who, in answer to 
the prayers of His children, alters the currents of those 
phenomena." And he adds, "Thus far theology and 
science go hand in hand." It may be asked, Why, then, 
do they part company ? According to Dr. Tyndall, it is 
on the question of verification by experiment. And he 
instances how decisive experiment is as a test of the truth 
of theory — the test applied to Newton's theory of the 



/ 



38 HOW DOES GOD ANSWER PRAYER ? 

emission of light. But the cases are not parallel. In the 
experiment upon light there were physical elements only 
to deal with. In the case of prayer, the element of will 
enters, and will acting with the physical forces to the desired 
result. And Dr. Tyndall's theory of experiment must 
embrace all the facts. In every instance in which human 
will acts concurrently with the physical forces in producing 
physical effects, as in the cultivation of plants, if Dr. 
Tyndall's theory be right, the portion due to natural forces, 
and the portion due to will, ought in every case to emerge 
from the experiment with the distinction plainly marked. 
No one will pretend to effect such a separation as this. 
Our theory is that prayer does not produce a distinct and 
separable portion of these effects, but that by its own efficacy 
it secures the efficacy of the physical forces, according to 
the good pleasure of God. It is impossible, therefore, in 
the nature of things, to separate by any analysis known to 
science the effect of prayer in changing the currents of 
natural phenomena from that of the natural forces. And 
the demand is unscientific. 

Then prayer acts at all distances ; it embraces the whole 
sphere of human life. And no man could insulate himself, 
by any non-conducting medium, from partaking of some of 
the forms of its influence. Prayer rests upon the field of 
the prayerless, when the supplication of his praying neigh- 
bour for a bountiful harvest ascends to God. Not even Dr. 
Tyndall could devise a non-conductor that would ward off 
its influence. Thousands of prayers are being offered every 
day for the increase and wide diffusion of all useful know- 
ledge — for seats of learning, for colleges and schools, for 
professors and teachers. Prayer-influence enters the lecture- 
rooms and laboratories and observatories, where the princes 
of science are exploring the wonderful works of God, and 
revealing the boundless treasures of wisdom and knowledge 
which they conceal, unconsciously to the operators. And 
what indeed would the great body of the Christian people 
know of the works of God but for the researches and dis- 
coveries of such men } And let us thank God they are not 




HOW DOES GOD ANSWER PRAYER? 39 

all prayerless and unbelieving. Well may Christians pray for 
the success of their labours, for they are illustrating the power 
and wisdom and goodness of God in away incompetent to any 
who do not spend their lives in observation and experiment. 
The most sceptical amongst them are doing service to reli- 
gion, helping the faith of the intelligent Christian, supplying 
ever-fresh grounds for adoration and praise to the glorious 
Creator. They are daily bringing to light facts sufficient 
to discredit their unbelieving theories. They are " hewers 
of wood and drawers of water for the house of our God." 

When, therefore, we ask for changes in our relations with 
nature, beneficial to health or safety or prosperity, for 
ourselves or others, it is in the faith that God is able so to 
control the agencies of nature that they shall simply satisfy 
the desire expressed by the prayer, and that then their 
intensity shall exhaust itself; or when the desired effect has 
been produced, the forces may generate other sequences 
which shall find their place in the current of events without 
disturbance to the order of nature. We know that by 
methods known to science it is possible to localise, in 
increased or diminished amount, some of the great forces of 
nature ; and when the desired effect has been produced, 
they are liberated to follow the law of their dispersion. To 
to this fact we owe not only interesting scientific experi- 
ments on electricity and magnetism, but also most important 
economic results, as in telegraphy and other instances. 
And it is conceivable that God may, by means in His own 
power, or by His mere volition, locally control the intensity 
of any physical force within hmits sufficient for the special 
end, without any appreciable change in the surrounding 
phenomena. And the effect might appear in connection 
with the prayer in a manner so marked to the immediate 
suppliant, that it would be thankfully recognised as due to 
the efficacy of prayer, while that element would still elude 
all methods of scientific verification. On Dr. Tyndall's own 
interpretation of prayer as " a form of physical energy, or 
as the equivalent of such energy," what is to be expected 
but physical effects! 



I 



40 HOW DOES GOD ANSWER PRAYER? 

Man is comprehended in the order of nature. He is a 
being with wants and desires, with mind and will. The 
course of nature does not supply, as has been already 
noticed, his wants in the forms required by his constitution. 
What would be the value of his will in his connection with 
the system of nature, if it can do nothing in changing 
natural phenomena, either through the agency of man's own 
body or through his supplications to a higher power, when 
even his own life is concerned ? His wants arise out of the 
course of nature ; his volition must affect the course of 
nature, and transform its products to satisfy them. And 
nature is found pliant to his will within the limits necessary 
to his life and well-being. It is no extravagance of faith to 
believe that nature is pliant in the hand of its Creator, and 
that He can employ its ordinances in answering prayer. 
Those ordinances are the vehicles of His will in conducting 
His relations with man. They are the agents of His bene- 
volence. Is it not conceivable that He may, under condi- 
tions of special need to His children, increase or diminish 
the intensity of the action of natural law, and affect the 
productiveness of a harvest or the course of a disease, 
without disturbing the equipoise of nature ? A tornado in 
China produces no sensible effect upon the atmospheric 
phenomena of our own country. A thunder-storm in the 
next county shall have spent itself, but no atmospheric dis- 
turbance intimates the fact to us. If rain shall fall over a 
limited area, it does not disturb the order of nature. If 
that rain fell in answer to prayer, by a special volition of 
God, would the effect upon the order of nature be different ? 
We do not ask for miraculous interpositions ; but we believe 
that there are possibilities within the order of nature which 
lie beyond the discoveries of science, which God holds in 
His own power, from the resources of which He can supply 
healing and help as His children require. But it is sufficient 
for us to know that as man is able to "alter" the pheno- 
mena of nature within certain limits, but which are daily 
expanding, and without disturbing the order of nature, we 
are amply warranted in believing that nature is plastic in 




PRAYER NOT OF INVARIABLE EFFICACY. 41 

the hand of Omnipotence, that God may rule the relations 
between man and nature for man's good. And in settling 
the stability of nature, it is evident that He reserved a 
margin with sufficient mobility to allow of the play of free 
wills, and for the efficacy of prayer. 

VIII. — Prayer not of Invariable Efficacy. 

Another reason why it is not possible, by any scientific 
process, to detect the physical effect of prayer as distin- 
guished from the effects of the physical forces, is this — 
namely, it is not of uniform and invariable efficacy. 

In the former part of this lecture I showed that prayer, 
as a law of our social relations, is limited in its efficacy ; 
and this limitation is necessary to the order of society. 
And it is a proof of the identity of the law in the natural 
relations with that in the spiritual, that in both it is of 
limited efficacy. Of course there are lim.its to our asking. 
We cannot ask what we know to be morally wrong. We 
cannot ask what our natural reason teaches us would be 
unreasonable, and what our observation of the course and 
constitution of nature shows us to be fixed and unalterable. 
We cannot ask that past time be recalled, that accom- 
plished facts should cease to be facts. Even within the limits 
of possibility there are many things which we feel we could 
not ask without feeling ourselves chargeable with folly. 

But apart from such classes of things as these, it is necessary 
for our own good, and for the general good, that there should 
be a limit placed upon the efficacy of our prayers, even when 
we ask for things lawful in themselves. Nature teaches us, 
not less than Scripture, that we know not what to pray for 
as we ought, in relation to the things of this life. We might 
ask for some temporal advantage to our condition which 
might seem to us perfectly right to ask ; but things are so 
linked together in the course of nature that this good thing 
could not come alone, but would, by some natural necessity, 
bring other things in its train which might become the dead 
fly in the box of ointment. Considering: that chanijcs run in 



42 PRAYER NOT OF INVARIABLE EFFICACY. 

series, and that series cross series at all angles, we are alto- 
gether incompetent to calculate or to imagine how many 
changes, nor of what character, may, by necessary physical 
action, follow upon the one which we desire. The whole 
interests of man and of the universe are under the govern- 
ment of God, and it is necessary that He should, both for 
the good of the individual and for the general good, impose 
a limitation upon the efficacy of prayer. Our narrow vision 
fixes itself upon some purely personal interest, the whole 
form and colour of which may be changed to us in a day. 
and it shall have lost all value in our eyes ; but the conse- 
quences of our change of mind begin a new series of pheno- 
mena, running on we know not whither, nor to what issues, 
Were there no limits to the efficacy of prayer for physical 
effects, physical phenomena would be undergoing ceaseless 
abnormal changes. The invariable efficacy of prayer would 
be absolutely destructive. Even the interests of praying men 
are often antagonistic, therefore in their prayers asking for 
opposite and contradictory physical effects. The sequences 
of some desired change disappoint us ; we ask for its rever- 
sal, and so on from day to day ; and the destruction of the 
course of nature would result from the prayers of men. 
And this would be the end of a system of prayer whose 
physical effects were capable of scientific verification. But 
the will of God counts for much in controlling the current 
of events, by controlling the efficacy of prayer. 

These necessary limits imposed upon the efficacy of 
prayer render its uniformity impossible, and therefore ren- 
ders it impossible for science to discover its law, so as to 
bring it within the reach of scientific verification. The 
reasons of the volitions of a Being infinitely free are beyond 
the scrutiny of man, and will not subject themselves to his 
methods of examination. But from the fact that tlie Divine 
will is free to determine when any given prayer shall be 
effectual, all Christians learn never to ask for any physical 
effects unconditionally. They know that the relation be- 
tween prayer and the answer is not the relation of cause 
and effect ; the sequences are not invariable. The will of 



THE TRUE TEST OF THE EFFICACY OF PRAYER. 43 

God is supreme in the matter ; and they know that to ask a 
favour is not to assert a right. Therefore, with every peti- 
tion for temporal good they present an alternative prayer, 
" Thy will be done." They are prepared, at whatever cost, 
to forego any form of physical good, that the Divine will 
may be done. Their great aim is to have their wills con- 
formed to the will of God ; then if His will is done, so is 
theirs. Temporal good is not the main end of their prayers. 
No method of verification known to science is applicable 
to the efficacy of prayer. Although involving physical 
effects, it cannot be tried by physical tests. Nothing less 
than the subversion of the present economy of the world 
would supply facts sufficient to satisfy Dr. Tyndall, and 
men like-minded, of the reality of the efficacy of prayer ; 
and then the proof would be destroyed in the method. It 
would be impossible, by any scientific method, to test the 
reality of the prayer of any individual. No human mind is 
naked and open before any other. No man, therefore, 
could with any certainty connect any event with any other 
man's prayer. Even the occurence of the event sought for 
would not always be certain evidence that it came in answer 
to the prayer. It might be a mere coincidence. How could 
any man prove to another that it was not ? If, then, the 
efficacy of prayer eludes the test of science, and if even 
uncertainty may rest upon the connection between an event 
asked in prayer, and the prayer that sought it, is there any 
evidence by which the efficacy of prayer may be tested and 
known ? 

IX. — The True Test of the Efficacy of Prayer. 

I by no means deny that in special cases, of a public kind, 
the event may be so marked that believers in the efficacy 
of prayer will be fully persuaded that it has occurred in 
answer to prayer. But if the answer came unmarked by 
startling phenomena, it would not satisfy sceptical men ; 
nor even then, for they would still believe that the pheno- 
mena, although unusual, were still the effect of natural 
causes. And if the desired event occurred in the course of 



44 THE TRUE TEST OF THE EFFICACY OF PRAYER. 

nature, it would be ascribed to natural causes alone. And 
as prayer for physical effects is accompanied, as a rule, by 
physical effort, it is always open to men to ascribe the effect 
to the observed effort alone. And even those who have no 
speculative doubts about the efficacy of prayer, may show 
less confidence in it practically than in the efficacy of their 
own effort. The evidence is not overwhelming of the effi- 
cacy of prayer, or there could be no scepticism on the 
subject. If proof of the existence of God and religious 
truth possessed all the force of demonstration, no man 
could be an unbeliever ; but then his faith would have no 
moral value. It would not be moral at all. Then, again, in 
the case of individuals ; they may have the highest moral 
evidence that their prayers have been answered, but they 
cannot make others partake of their conviction by any 
evidence they can impart. Those who have similar ex- 
perience will believe their statement, knowing it to be alto- 
gether credible. But it is wise and right to acknowledge 
that no evidence of the efficacy of prayer for physical effects, 
sufficient to compel the credence of sceptics, is forthcoming. 
But I believe there is a form of evidence sufficient for the 
Christian, which, though it will not bear a physical test, will 
bear the test of reason. Let it be kept in mind that all 
along we have been speaking of prayer for physical effects. 
But then all Christians know that they do not pray for such 
effects to come alone. They pray that spiritual benefits may 
accompany them. If they ask for restored health, they ask 
at the same time that it may be sanctified to themselves and 
others. The prayer itself is a spiritual action ; they ask for 
a physical good. The spiritual and the physical are com- 
bined in the prayer, and they desire that they shall be 
combined in the answer ; and the answer would not be 
according to the prayer if it did not convey both. The 
test of the efficacy of the Christian's prayer would not be 
the physical benefit, if it actually came to him in the form 
desired, if it came alone. With what feeling and with what 
state of mind is it received .-* This is the test. Is it received 
merely with the natural satisfaction of a desire accom- 



THE TRUE TEST OF THE EFFICACY OF PRAYER. 45 

plished, and with self-gratulation in the enjoyment of a 
valuable possession ? This is a natural state of mind, and 
not a spiritual. On the other hand, is it received with 
solemn, cheerful thankfulness — with more joy in it as a token 
of the favour of the Giver than in the gift itself.-^ Then 
the prayed-for gift has not come alone, presenting only its 
own proper value. It has brought something better than 
itself — a happy sense of God's regard penetrating the whole 
soul, until it is bright with the radiance of gratitude. 
What, then, can follow but a revived faith, a warmer love, 
and a renewed dedication ? Then arises the sense of obli- 
gation to use the gift according to the clearly indicated 
design of the Giver. Now these feelings and states of mind 
are spiritual, but they are not less natural and rational, con- 
sidering the relations between the Giver and the receiver ; 
and they are in entire accordance with the nature of the 
human mind. Such an experience as this, coming with the 
material gift asked in prayer, would be a proof to every 
believer of the efficacy of prayer, strong enough to turn 
aside any sceptical argument. And this experience is 
repeating itself daily with the prayed-for gift of our daily 
bread, sustaining the strength of the Christian life. 

But there are other physical effects of a painful kind 
which also issue in spiritual benefit to the children of God. 
There are bodily sufferings, and adversity of circumstances, 
and trying bereavements. But do we pray for these ? Not 
specially. But we present petitions which we know will 
involve these afflictions in the answer. The Christian prays, 
" Father, glorify Thy name," in me, in my heart and life ; 
and that may imply fiery trial. And there is a second 
petition like unto the first, "Sanctify me wholly;" and 
according to the law of the Father's house, this necessitates 
chastisement by various forms of calamity, for "what son 
is he whom the Father chasteneth not.^" We pray for 
physical good, and spiritual good comes in the answer. We 
pray for spiritual good, and physical suffering is combined 
with it in the answer. And the soul learns to say, " Good 
is the will of the Lord." The will of the Lord is the rule 



46 THE MAIN END OF PRAYER. 

and measure of the Christian's prayer. He gives it the first 
place, therefore. 

The test here named offers itself to the judgment of 
mental science ; and a thoughtful examination of conscious- 
ness would, I think, show to even a sceptic that, grant there 
is a God, and that He holds converse with men, and the 
experience we have noted would seem not only possible to 
the mind, but also to be the logical consequence of the 
relation. 

X. — The Main End of Prayer. 

Asking and receiving even amongst men are not the 
main ends of prayer. The bestowal of material help, the 
transfer of material good from one to another in response 
to asking, are not the main ends of prayer. These are signs 
and symbols of states of feeling, the cultivation of which is 
the grand end of our mutual dependences. And these 
mutual dependences are the conditions out of which our 
desire of association springs, and which make society a 
permanent necessity. And we are dependent upon society 
for the exercise and cultivation of those sentiments and 
affections upon which our moral perfection and happiness 
depend, more than upon any amount of adjustment between 
our nature and its material environments. When asking 
and receiving are the symbolic language of kindness and 
good-will, the whole intercourse of mutually dependent life 
moves on with tranquil and harmonious action. And the 
main end of prayer in our relation with God is not the 
receiving the bountiful supplies of His providence, nor 
restoration from sickness, nor protection from calamities, 
nor length of days ; but the cultivation of a right state of 
mind toward God — love, trust, reverence — and thus to enjoy 
His fellowship. But if He never answers our prayers — never 
extends His help in weakness or danger — never consoles a 
sorrow, what could we believe but that He was indifferent 
to our happiness ? And would it reconcile us to all this 
disregard to be told that He had bound Himself by inflex- 
ible laws never to answer a prayer — never to respond to the 



THE MAIN END OF PRAYER. 47 

cry of beings, the prime law of whose existence is depend- 
ence upon Himself? What state of mind would this beget 
but estrangement and aversion? But the impulse to pray is 
so natural to man, and in such constant exercise in all our 
social relations, that in spite of the sophistry of unbelief, our 
nature teaches us that He who has made us dependent and 
praying beings is Himself the hearer of prayer. And as 
prayer belongs to our mental and moral nature, the infer- 
ence is irresistible that it has a higher end to serve than is 
required in the inter-relations of mankind — that it is neces- 
sary to maintain our relations with God. And this is its 
pre-eminent distinction — that it keeps the spirit of man in 
contact with the mind of God, in the consciousness of 
dependence, in the faith of His kindness, in the happy con- 
fidence of His never-failing and ever-present lielp. It 
secures a constant enquiry after His will, a watchful obser- 
vation of His providences, and a jealous guarding of our 
desires, that we cherish none which may not be formed into 
prayers, and be presented with confidence to God. Then 
there is a constant alternating between prayer and thank- 
fulness for prayer answered, ever ministering to the health, 
the vigour, and the cheerful content of the spiritual life. 
And the crowning result of this nearness to God by prayer 
is the accordance of our wills with the will of God, and the 
consequent assimilation to the Divine character. In this 
is fulfilled the perfection of man. This is the main end of 
prayer. 

I Concurrently with this highest end, there is the cultivation 
of the unity and fellowship of the praying brotherhood 
throughout the world. They are ever praying for one 
another. It is most pleasant and grateful to think of being 
comprehended in the prayers of all believers. Millions are 
praying for you. Their prayers compass you about in your 
daily life, failing upon your fields and homes and hearts as 
imperceptibly, yet as really and beneficently, as the dew at 
eventide. And you are reciprocating their prayers, bearing 
the interests of all the brethren on your heart before the 
Lord ; and the whole household of faith, in spite of all 



48 THE MAIN END OF PRAYER. 

dividing influences, realise their common relation to the 
Father. But this is not all. The whole body of the faithful 
unite in supplication for all men, in relation to all interests 
which are common to man — bursting the narrow bounds of 
self-interest, expanding our human sympathies, and testi- 
fying to the brotherhood of man. Every thoughtful believer 
in the efficacy of prayer, therefore, realises the fact that 
prayer is a power in the world, an established law of its 
order, indispensable to order, co-operating with every other 
law in the production even of physical effects. And there 
is no more reason to believe that health will be restored 
without prayer than without medicine ; nor that the harvests 
of the world shall be less indebted to prayer than to sun- 
shine for their ripeness. Prayer is as widely diffused over 
the earth as the sunshine, and is as much an ordinance of 
God as the sunshine, or as man's labour, in promoting the 
fertility of the earth. It is a power over the human mind, 
a power in social life, a power in the world's politics, in 
science and philosophy, and, above all, in the spiritual life 
of man. But its power is not being fully proved, through 
the want of the strong faith to which the greatest effects 
are promised. And we often ask amiss, and are therefore 
not heard ; and at the best our prayers are imperfect. ■] 
And we need the Spirit of grace and of supplications to 
purify our desires, that we may ask in faith, nothing 
doubting. 

But prayer has its perfection, under perfect conditions, 
conditions so pure, so perfect, that whatsoever is asked is 
given in terms of the asking ; and in this case there is no 
limit to its efficacy. It is the intercession of the Divine 
Redeemer — " Him the Father heareth alway." And He 
Himself has told us what the law of effectual prayer is — 
''Whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in my name, He 
will s^ive it you." 



Jh.y 



(Si 




m% J^spnsiMlitg fq Ms %^\t% 



7 



REV. JOHN MACNAUGHTAN. 



1 



A ^ 




MAN'S RESPONSIBILITY FOR HIS BELIEF. 



♦•» 



!N entering upon the discussion of this theme, it is neces- 
sary to define the terms of it — Man^ Respojtsibility, and 
Belief, By man, we understand every human being pos- 
sessed of those faculties and feehngs that are proper to 
humanity — not man as a mere sentient creature, nor man as 
a higher animal endowed with intellect, and enabled thereby 
to observe, to reason, and to judge ; but man as an intel- 
lectual and moral being, with mind and conscience, with 
affections and emotions, combined with a will whose volitions 
enable him to determine and decide — in short, man as we 
find him in the everyday walks of life. 

Responsibility is a term imported into the English 
language from the Latin tongue — its root is the verb 
(respondeo) " to answer" — and describes an existing relation- 
ship to some Superior, who has a right to question, and to 
require a reply. Terms of similar import and significance 
are found in all known languages, and seem to indicate, from 
their use, an almost universal belief that the transactions of 
human life will one day be reviewed and inquired into by 
the Governor and Lord of all. The prominent idea involved 
in " answerableness," or responsibility, is that of a judgment 
throne — a future great assize — presided over by some One 
who has the power and the right to supervise the life of 
man, to sift his every motive, to analyse his most complex 
actions, and adjudge such penalty or reward as justice may 
demand — in short, the very existence of the term, implies 
the belief that man is not independent, that he is the subject 
of moral government, and must give an account of himself 
to God. 

It is interesting to find such terms in all languages; 
for if language is the reflection of the facts and feelings of 



4 USE OF LANGUAGE IMPLIES RESPONSIBILITY. 

human nature, the image of existing ideas, the use of such 
terms originates the inquiry, How came they to find a place 
in the vocabularies of earth ? Not certainly as the result of 
education, or of domestic training, though these expand 
and enforce the ideas which such terms convey ; they seem 
to be inwrought with the feelings and the instincts of 
humanity, and to crop up with the earliest manifestations 
of our reflective powers. The use of such phrases as — / 
otight, yoii ought not, you sJwidd have done, it was your duty 
to act differently, seems to be the natural outcome of the 
innate or underlying thought, that responsibility to the 
Creator and Moral Governor of the universe is a very part 
of the nature He hath bestowed upon us. 

There is a beautiful passage on this subject in Taylor's 
" Natural History of Enthusiasm." When arguing that the 
terms found in language must have their archetypes in 
nature, and applying this argument to the subject of man's 
responsibility, he says : — "If man is not a moral agent, and 
if his sphere in this respect does not immeasurably tran- 
scend that of the sentient orders around him, how came he 
to talk as if he were a moral agent } If, in regard to a moral 
system, he is only a brute of finer form, born of the earth, 
and returning to it again, whence is it that in respect of 
virtue and vice, of good and evil, the dialect of heaven rolls 
over his lips .'' whence was it, and how, that he stole the 
vocabulary of the skies .'' " We need not go far for an answer 
to the general question — Am I a responsible being 1 Our 
own consciousness furnishes the reply ; and such acknow- 
ledgments as — / ought not to commit sin, / ought to love my 
neighbour, / ought to love and fear God, are echoes from the 
depths of man's constitution, proclaiming that his freedom 
to think and act and will has its limits. For, as the apostle 
saith in the Epistle to the Romans, " Every one of us shall 
give account of himself to God." 

Belief includes all opinions, thoughts, and sentiments, 
whatever the subject of these may be — social, political, scien- 
tific, or religious ; all the various conclusions to which the 
human mind may come on facts, on questions, on doctrines, 



WHAT BELIEF INCLUDES. 5 

rlvhen it has sources of information and capacity for weighing 
the evidences by which such sentiments seem to be sustained. 
But when beHef is associated with responsibility, there are 
many hmits to be observed which greatly narrow the 
question. There are entire classes of beliefs to which no 
moral character can be attached ; and these, of course, are 
excluded from the discussion. I believe that a stone is 
hard, that a ball is round, that a box is square, and so forth ; 
but there is nothing moral in such opinions. I believe the 
axioms that form the bases of all mathematical conclusions, 
and I hold the accuracy and correctness of the solutions 
they enable me to arrive at \ but there is nothing in the 
results of exact science that involves merit or demerit. The 
process followed out is a purely intellectual one ; and there 
is neither moral excellence nor guilt in the reception or in 
the refusal of the conclusions. 

Again, while man is responsible to society for his actions, 
and is under the control of its governments and subject to 
its laws, he is not responsible to his fellow-man, nor to 
the powers and dominions of this world, for his thoughts 
and opinions, so long as he keeps; them to himself His 
sentiments may be of the most treasonable character, utterly 
subversive of the integrity and good order of the State ; but 
if he keeps these hidden in the secret chambers of his own 
mind, no earthly power has a right to demand that they 
shall be dragged to the light,, be adjudicated on by any 
earthly tribunal, and be dealt with as if they had been 
published openly to the injury and detriment of the nation. 

The soul of man is a little world of its own, and within 
that sacred domain man is as free to think as he is to 
breathj. God alone is Lord of the conscience ; He is the 
Lawgiver and the Judge in and over the heart. 

This truth is the foundation of all enlightened toleration 
— of all true liberty. No doubt tyranny and bigotry have 
often attempted to invade this citadel, and by the force of 
agonising tortures have extracted from quivering lips the 
secrets of thought ; men maddened by pain may sometimes 
have disclosed their hidden belief, to the eternal infamy of 



6 ALL MEN NOT EQUALLY RESPONSIBLE. 

their inquisitors. But all such processes are ineffectual to 
suppress that freedom of thinking which is man's birthright. 
Coercion in the region of opinion may make men hypo- 
crites ; it never can be consistent with the duties of rulers 
of Churches or of States. 

It is altogether, however, a different question — Will God, 
as the Moral Governor of the universe, judge of our most 
secret thoughts, and take account of all our opinions and 
beliefs ? If it be true that not a ripple passes over the wave, 
nor an insect hovers in the sky, nor a leaf trembles in the 
forest, that is not observed by the Divine All-seeing Eye, 
will not this exquisite minuteness of inspection penetrate 
the soul, range over all the thoughts, and witness the form- 
ation of opinions.'^ And, in the day when God judges the 
world, will not our thoughts and beliefs be found graven on 
the imperishable tablets of eternity, and rise from the 
grave of our memories to be arraigned and judged of in 
the day of final account ? 

Again, when discussing the question of man's responsi- 
bility to God for his belief, we do not mean that all men are 
equally responsible for the opinions they hold ; the degree 
of accountability must be regulated by circumstances, as of 
position, of privilege, of opportunity. Some men are, un- 
questionably, without any fault of their own, at far greater 
disadvantage than others, as regards their means and oppor- 
tunities for hearing and receiving truth ; their responsibilities 
must be proportionately less. Men, for example, who never 
could have heard of the gospel doctrine of salvation by 
grace, cannot be chargeable with 'unbelief, nor with the 
rejection of a redemption that was never offered to them. 
On this point the Scripture testimony is clear and explicit — 
a man is accepted of God according to what he hath, and 
not according to what he hath not ; or more expressly still, 
in Romans ii. I2,i6 — " For as many as have sinned without 
law shall also perish without law : and as many as have 
sinned in the law shall be judged by the law ; in the day 
when God shall judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ." 

Again, when afhrming that a moral character attaches to 



fl 

I 



LIMITS OF RESPONSIBILITY. 7 

opinion or belief, we do not restrict our thoughts to the act 
of the mind dealing with a certain amount of evidence 
presented to it at the time when it forms its opinion ; but 
include all that influences the judgment, all those self-pro- 
duced inclinations, that bias the understanding and colour 
its conclusions ; in short, whatever in nature, in research, in 
habit, or in neglected means of information, hinders the mind 
from appreciating evidence, and prevents it from giving due 
weight to its value. Very possibly the persecuting Jews and 
Pagans in the first age of Christianity were sincere enough 
in the belief that they did right in putting Christians to 
torture and to death. It was the time predicted by Jesus, 
when every one that killed His disciples thought, they did 
God service ; they pleaded conscience in justification of 
their wicked deeds : but their minds were ill informed ; 
their hearts were inflamed by passion ; they should have 
known better, and have felt more kindly. And if we could 
absolve them from all criminality in believing that to imbrue 
their hands in the blood of the martyrs was serving God, 
what moral guilt could attach to the acts that were the 
necessary consequences of such a faith as that ? 

The main point in this controversy is whether or not 
belief is moral in its nature, or is a necessary and unavoid- 
able result of evidence presented to the intellect ; is man in 
believing absolutely passive, so that it is physically im- 
possible for him to do otherwise than he does, whether he 
receives or rejects any specific dogma or doctrine.-* It is 
chiefly in connexion with theological truths or religious 
beliefs that these issues are raised ; and therefore we shall 
consider, first, what are the teachings of the Scriptures on 
the point ; and then inquire whether the lessons of the 
Bible are in harmony with the conclusions of philosophy, 
and the ascertained results of human experience. 

If man is not responsible for his belief, then unbelief can- 
not be a sin ; for if it is not a voluntary act, no fault can be 
attached to the man who rejects the truth which God, in 
His word, has proposed for acceptance. It may be a 
loss to the man not to have believed, but he cannot be con- 



8 SCRIPTURE DOCTRINE OF RESPONSIBILITY. 

sured nor condemned for that mental process over which he 
had no control ; his believing could not have raised him in 
moral excellence, and his non-believing cannot involve the 
disapprobation of God, nor the forfeiture of any benefit or 
blessing which His gracious hand would otherwise have 
bestowed. 

Assuredly this is not the light in which belief and unbelief 
are set forth in the inspired record. Faith is therein 
described as the highest and noblest virtue, and unbelief as 
a deadly and ruinous sin — a sin peculiarly dishonouring to 
God and destructive to the soul, to be followed by the 
direst penalties, and admitting neither of palliation nor of 
apology. All through the Bible, belief and unbelief are held 
to be works or acts of man — ^the subjects of praise or of 
censure, of promise or of threatening ; in short, they have 
attached to them all the responsibilities that can cleave to 
the actions of any free, moral agent in the universe of God. 

It is not unworthy of notice, in passing, that in the New 
Testament the same word is sometimes translated ^mbeliefy 
and sometimes disobedience ;'^ and as disobedience always 
implies the existence of a command (for where there is no 
law there can be no transgression), so a commandment, 
issued by a great and gracious ruler, always implies the 
existence of a will, in the subject of that order, either to 
obey or to despise the injunction. The whole language of the 
Bible is constructed on the recognition of this principle — as 
when we are commanded to search the Scriptures, to receive 
the truth, to seek for wisdom, to know God, to believe on 
Jesus, and to accept the message of reconciliation. 

Let us examine this point a little more minutely. Faith 
or belief is described as a duty. God requires us to believe; 
our believing is an act of obedience to His will ; for God is 
obeyed when His testimony is believed — '* They have not all 
obeyed the gospel. For Esaias saith, Lord, who hath believed 
our report.'*" — "A great company of the priests were obedient 
■^ ttTret^eta. Compare Rom. xi. 32 with Ephes. ii. 2 ; and again, as 
identifying unbelief with disobedience, John iii. 36, *0 Se a.-Kf.iQdv is 
contrasted with 6 tticttcvwv. 




SCRIPTURE DOCTRINE THAT FAITH IS A DUTY. 9 

to the faith." " Ye have obeyed from the heart that form of 
doctrine which was deHvered you." " This is His command- 
ment, That we should believe on the name of His Son Jesus 
Christ." Now, whatever be the nature of faith or belief 
(and we shall advert to that by-and-by), it is the object of a 
command that issues from the throne of the Eternal, an act 
of obedience demanded by the Sovereign Lord of all from 
His intelligent creatures — an obedience that can only be 
yielded when the will consents to believe what His precept 
requires. 

Again, the commandment to believe is enforced by the 
very highest sanctions that can be attached to any law of 
God. The rewards conditioned on belief, and the penalties 
affixed to unbelief, are the grandest and the most awful to 
which our conceptions can reach — EVERLASTING LIFE, AND 
ETERNAL DEATH. "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and 
thou shalt be saved." " He that believeth shall be saved ; 
he that believeth not shall be damned." " He that believeth 
not the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abideth 
on him." " He that believeth not God hath made Him a 
liar." " The Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven, . . . 
taking vengeance on them that know not God, and that 
OBEY not the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ: who shall be 
punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of 
the Lord, and from the glory of His power; when He shall 
come to be glorified in His saints, and to be admired in all 
them that believe!' " This is the condemnation, that light is 
come into the world, and men have loved darkness rather 
than light, because their deeds were evil." In all these 
passages unbelief is described as a sin, a moral evil, which 
not only leaves man an unforgiven transgressor, with all his 
guilt crushing him into ruin, but as being itself 2. heinous 
transgression, involving an indescribable amount of guilt, 
and therefore followed by certain judgment; so that on 
account d?/" unbelief, men are as certainly guilty before God, 
as they are if chargeable with murder or any other crime. 
Hence it is that, in the catalogue given us in the Book of 
Revelation of those who are finally and for ever outcasts 



10 MAN CONDEMNED FOR UNBELIEF. 

from God, the tmbelieviiig occupy a conspicuous place. 
" The fearful, and UNBELIEVING, and the abominable, and 
murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, 
and all liars, shall have their part in the lake which burneth 
with fire and brimstone : which is the second death." 

What sanctions grander than these : hfe, eternal life — 
bliss, endless bliss, in fellowship with God— happiness in 
common and in communion with all the pure and the holy 
of the moral creation of Jehovah ! And woe, unutterable 
woe, the punishment of unbelief! Can it be that no moral 
character attaches to belief or to unbelief? Can it be 
that, where there is no moral delinquency, the Holy and the 
Just One will overwhelm with terrific judgment.-* "Shall 
not the Judge of all the earth do right.?" 

The truths of the Gospel are presented to the human 
mind very much as other truths are — that is, accompanied 
with evidence suited to man's capacity for understanding 
them, and sufficient in amount to induce and warrant his 
cordial reception and belief of them. But the evidence, 
however varied and multiform, is not the only element that 
determines the belief — it is the discernment of that evidence 
that brings about the faith. 

In the evening sky, millions of stars sparkle in gorgeous 
splendour, lighting up the depths of night, and revealing 
the wondrous glories of the works of God ; but no amount 
of intellectual capacity would enable the mind to take in 
the idea of that immeasurable expanse, or picture to the 
soul the panorama of the skies, unless there was an eye to 
look upon it — that is, an actual power of discerning what 
the visible universe displayed. There is another heaven — 
the sky of Revelation ; every truth of God studs that 
sphere like a very sun, and each truth that sparkles in 
that firmament carries with it the evidence of its Divine 
origin ; but if the eye of the soul be closed, or if the moral 
vision be diseased or distorted, the evidence will fail to 
convince, for it will not be discerned. Just as light, 
though self-demonstrative, cannot be known without the 
eye; so Divine truth, flashing first from the heart of God, 



BELIEF DEPENDENT ON DISCERNMENT OF EVIDENCE. 11 

cannot be comprehended except by the heart — that is 
to say, if we merely exercise our reason about the truths 
of the Gospel, they may remain to us a dead letter, or a 
mass of tangled dogmas, and of strange conceptions ; and 
we may turn over page after page of the written record, 
and never come into contact with its grand central truth, 
the key to the comprehension of all the rest. 

We have said that belief depends on the discernment of 
evidence, and we must here add that the power to discern 
depends largely on the inquirer himself; and hence one 
source of his accountability. It is his work to collect and 
examine evidence, to weigh and consider arguments, to 
watch against prejudice, to inform himself of the facts that 
bear upon the thoughts presented to his mind ; and surely 
it is easy to conceive of this being done carelessly, indo- 
lently, and partially, or not done at all, so that the con- 
clusions will be as defective as the examinations were 
imperfect. In such a case, culpability must attach to error 
in opinion, when closer scrutiny would have led to a very 
different judgment. For example, my understanding cannot 
assent to the proposition that Jesus Christ is the Son of God 
till I have apprehended what the terms of the statement 
mean ; but this cannot be done if my will is so slothful, so 
worldly, or so disposed towards the lusts and pleasures of 
the world, as never to suffer me to think of them seriously ; 
and in that sense the understanding is at the disposal of 
the will. 

Nor is it to be forgotten how much a man's habits in- 
fluence his opinions. Let him blunt his moral feelings by 
indulgence — let pride, or lust, or passion, or avarice, or 
vanity, establish themselves on the throne of the affections, 
and they will bend and bias the intellect ; inclination will 
overbear judgment, a depraved taste will prevent the soul 
from approaching truth with an ingenuous desire to know 
it, and to follow it, the light will be refused because the 
deeds are evil. This is the explanation of the fact that the 
force of argument and the power of evidence tell very 
differently on different minds. In the case of some honest 



12 man's moral relationship to god. 

inquirers, they sweep like an avalanche all doubt and diffi- 
culty from the field of belief ; while in other cases argument 
and evidence come like the mists of the morning, and hide 
for a little moment the rocks of error and ravines of doubt ; 
but these mists speedily pass away, and leave the whole 
panorama as wild and desolate as before. In all such cases 
the want of belief does not arise from lack of evidence, but 
from the perverted state of the heart, and the moral 
influences that are allowed to overbear the judgment. 

This is admitted by all who adopt the Scriptural account 
of belief, and who hold that whosoever believeth on the 
Lord Jesus shall be saved ; nor can any objection be 
reasonably taken to a reference to the history and operation 
of gospel faith or belief, inasmuch as this involves the 
highest interests of man, deals with the grandest and most 
momentous of all opinions, brings into view our moral 
relationship to God, and enables us to analyse minutely the 
operation of heart and mind and conscience in the formation 
of the noblest species of belief. 

The grand difficulty that stands in the way of a sinner's 
forming a right opinion of his moral relationship to God, 
and of giving a place in his heart to the message of salva- 
tion, does not arise from any want of evidence to prove the 
grand truth that " God so loved the world, that He gave 
his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him 
should not perish, but have everlasting life ;" nor from any 
difficulty about the fact that " God sent not His Son into the 
world to condemn the world, but that the world through 
Him might be saved ;" the difficulty lies in the state of the 
heart and will of the sinner. He cannot help feeling that 
the gospel truths stand on a different basis from all others — 
that their admission involves a change in the life, and an 
admission of responsibilities, that do not attach to any other 
beliefs. If received, he must submit his soul to God, in 
contrition, in fear, in gratitude : and by personal consecra- 
tion to duties that his likings, his tastes, his will, are opposed 
to ; hence, in the face of evidence, he will not come unto 
Christ (that is, he uill not believe) that he may have life. 



BELIEF A DUTY. 13 

These words were originally spoken to the Jews, and 
were true of the great majority of that unhappy people. 
They had the testimony of John, whom they acknowledged 
to be a prophet ; they had the evidence of miracles, the 
very signs and wonders they asked for ; they had the voice 
from heaven, attesting the character of Jesus ; and they 
had the testimony of their Scriptures, to which Christ 
appealed, saying, " They are they which testify of me." 
And yet they rejected the Messias as obstinately as if His 
claims had been supported by no evidence, or as if their 
duty and their interest justified their unbelief; it was want 
of will, and not lack of evidence, that kept them from 
believing. Will is not a mere principle ; it is under the 
direction of reason ; and yet there is a certain influence it 
wields over the mind. By a volition, it makes one thought 
take precedence of another, and one emotion command 
another ; and in this it is free, active, voluntary. If belief 
is the link between a soul and salvation, it is easy to under- 
stand that a man's responsibility depends largely on whether 
he has anything to do, personally and actively, with its 
existence and operation. Is it the result of a persuasion 
produced by evidence addressed to the understanding 1 or 
are there in the state of the heart moral barriers that resist 
the light, and act like fastenings on the closed windows of 
the intellect } And must man be a consenting party to 
their removal — in other words, is gospel faith or belief a 
result usually attained, or in its nature possible, without the 
will and heart of the man being cognisant and consenting 
parties t Assuredly it is not. The heart, the conscience, 
and the will must acknowledge the power of the truth, and 
the grand proof of belief be given, when the sinner yields 
himself to God. 

" In the work of believing," says Dr. South,* " the under- 
standing is chiefly at the disposal of the will ; for though it 
is not in the power of the will dh'cctly either to cause or to 
hinder the assent of the understanding, yet it is antecedently 
in the power of the will to apply the mind to, or to take it 
* South's " Sermons," Vol. i., page 96. 



14 GOSPEL BELIEF. 

off from, the consideration of those objects to which, with- 
out such a previous consideration, it cannot yield its assent, 
for all assent pre-supposes a simple apprehension of the 
terms of the proposition. But unless the understanding 
employ and exercise its cognitive power about these terms, 
there can be no apprehension of them; and the understand- 
ing, as to the exercise of this power, is subject to the com- 
mand of the will." And hence it is that the Lord Jesus 
stakes the whole character of His mission on the issue, that 
the evidence by which His doctrines were sustained was 
adequate and sufficient, and that the withholding of assent 
did not arise from want of light in the understanding, but 
from the perverseness of the will, and the corruptness of the 
heart. Now, just as certainly as the power to consent implies 
ability to refuse the consent, accountability for giving or 
withholding that assent is chargeable on man, and comes 
within the range of those acts for which, as a moral being, 
he is responsible to God, the Lord of all. 

When we examine the features of "gospel belief," or the 
reception of the grand truths about the way of life, which the 
revelation of God discloses, we find that the sinner has pre- 
sented to him a picture of himself as a lost, helpless, guilty 
transgressor. How is this to be believed by him ? Not by 
the force of testimony alone, apart from the acting of his 
own consciousness, the declaration of his own conscience, and 
the comparison of himself, as a moral agent, with the law of 
God. This sentiment, opinion, or belief, is not the mere 
result of external evidence presented to reason. Like a 
large part of our knowledge, it does not flow from reason ; 
for, just as in the sentient world, our belief in the properties 
of sensible objects is derived from the senses, and not from 
the reason ; for it is not reason that tells us that the odour of 
the rose is fragrant, or that musical sounds are harmonious. 
So in the moral world. We judge and form opinions 
largely by the power and operation of our moral sense ; and 
though the heart does not reason, yet within the limits of 
sentiment it comprehends as well, if not better, than reason 
does. Hence it has been well said — "All the effects of the 



I 



ELEMENTS OF GOSPEL BELIEF. 15 

most active intellect cannot give us a conception of the 
taste of a fruit we have never tasted, nor of the perfume of 
a flower we have never smelt, much less of an affection we 
have never felt." 

Now, as lowly views of one's self, profound personal humi- 
liation, the abasement of natural pride, the acknowledg- 
ment of sin and transgression before God, are acts that enter 
into the belief of gospel truth, acts that may be neglected 
or performed largely according to the will and liking of the 
man, they obviously come within the range of the opinions 
for which man is accountable. 

Again, if belief in an offered Saviour depends on the 
knowledge of His character. His person and work — such a 
knowledge as takes possession of the soul, and leads it to 
trust, to connde, to cling, with all the intenseness of ardent 
affection, to Him and to His cross — does it not imply care- 
ful examination of the truth, and personal, patient investi- 
gation of the grounds on which the Redeemer claims our 
reliance .? Are we not bound to test the strength and 
validity of the argument for believing on His name, so that 
we may be able to give a reason for the hope that is in us, 
whether we rely on His atonement, or depend on a righteous- 
ness of our own ? Here, surely, there is a field for voluntary 
action ; for while it is acknowledged that conviction must 
ultimately depend on evidence discerned, man, in the 
investigation of it, is plainly accountable for research, 
for honesty of inquiry, for diligence and attention, and 
for the honest endeavour to keep his mind free from all 
prejudice. 

Can we hold that the Jewish priests and scribes were not 
chargeable with guilt in rejecting Jesus as the Messiah, when 
they did not go even as far as Bethlehem to ascertain the 
facts about His birth .-' They were apparently expecting the 
appearance of the promised Saviour. They were able to 
give directions to the wise men from the East as to the 
locality in which He might be sought, and to verify their 
information from the sure word of prophecy. And yet, 
though they heard of His star in the East, they did not 



16 MAN, NOT MIND MERELY, THE SUBJECT OF BELIEF. 

make the least effort to convince themselves whether or 
not the King of the Jews was born. 

In the field of belief, are there no powers at work but 
reason and evidence, intellect and argument, nothing but 
the powers of the human understanding, busied with 
logical deductions, joining together its cords of ideas, 
till it finds itself immeshed in a web of inevitable con- 
clusions, and all this without allowing an inch of space 
for the influence of feeling or emotion ? Have we not, 
on this field, man — the whole man — acting as a free, 
voluntary agent } Do we not see him pausing over f/its 
proof, and scanning it very minutely — carelessly or wantonly 
passing by t/ia^ evidence as if it did not deserve his notice — 
his whole emotional nature now at work ; and now, again, 
his preconceptions inducing him to turn with scorn from 
the offered argument, his moral feeling, his will, his affec- 
tion, his intellect, all conspicuous throughout the entire 
process — not mind alone, but the man ? The /is prominent. 
The man sues for mercy, looks towards the Saviour, humbles 
himself before God, and expresses his new-found faith, 
when he exclaims, " Lord, I believe ; help Thou mine un- 
belief" It is the /who is the subject of the belief; not that 
any man saves himself, but that he is not saved without his 
own consent ; and hence the responsibility. 

This is illustrated by the figure of looking, which, in the 
Bible, is often used as the synonyme for believing — " Look 
unto me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth, for I am 
God, and there is none else" — "Looking unto Jesus, the 
author and finisher of our faith" — implying that, just as we 
have the command of our eyes, and can turn them towards 
or away from any visible object at will, so, in a certain sense, 
have we the command and control of our moral vision, and 
can direct it towards the great object of faith. This is, 
indeed, the history of the act of belief "We all with open 
face behold, as in a glass, the glory of the Lord," &c. — 
"Every one which seeth the Son, and believeth on Him" — 
that is, every one who, having seen the Son, hath believed 
on Him — "hath everlasting life." A single glance, unaffected 



MAN NOT PASSIVE IN THE FORMATION OF FAITH. 17 

and earnest — one child-like look, into which the affections 
of the soul are thrown — perceives in Jesus an infinitude of 
love and grace ; and that vision necessarily results in true 
belief 

Man is not passive in all, this ; the discernment of the 
glory of Christ is not forced on him ; it is with an open 
face he beholds the glory — dimly, it may be, at first, but 
becoming brighter and clearer as the result of thought and 
contemplation — till at the foot of the Cross he lifts up his 
eyes from the dust to the crucified Redeemer, and in the 
earnestness of a true belief exclaims, " My Lord and my God ! " 
In fine, on this part of the subject, if we receive the Bible 
as a revelation from God, there must be an onerous respon- 
sibility dependent on the use we make of its promises and 
exhortations, and on the degree of attention with which we 
listen to its commandments and warnings, arising from the 
authority of Him whose word it professes to be. If, instead 
of the voice of God in the written word, we were startled 
from our security by that voice speaking to us, as it did 
to Israel, out of the fire, and awing us into silence by 
blackness and darkness and tempest — would not our whole 
being be brought under the influence of that Speaker, and 
a deep sense of responsibility for believing or rejecting His 
message take possession of our souls.'* Or if, instead of quietly 
reading in the Scriptures the exhortation, "I pray you, in 
Christ's stead, be ye reconciled to God," Christ were to leave 
His eternal throne, leave the heavens, and come down into 
the midst of us, in all the glories of His Mount Tabor state, 
and ask us to believe in His atonement, and be reconciled to 
God by His blood — would we feel that we could treat this 
as an ordinary subject of inquiry, that our minds must of 
themselves inevitably act on the evidence presented, and 
that we would incur no special guilt if we concluded to 
disbelieve the proclamation, and reject the remedy offered 
for our guiltiness and sin ^ Nay, rather would we not feel 
that it would be impossible for us to escape personal 
accountability if we refused that offer of grace .'* And where 
is the radical difference between that imagined condition of 

I 



18 CAN MAN CONTROL THE ACTS OF HIS INTELLECT ? 

things and our present position ? Can we, if we receive the 
Bible as from God, separate altogether the voice of authority 
from its requirements, or place its truths on the ordinary 
level of statements in books of philosophy and science? 
Are not the truths the same, when enshrined in revelation 
and attested by sufficient evidence, as when spoken by 
the lips of the Lord ? And is not this Scriptural con- 
clusion regarding the testimony of God sufficient to estab- 
lish our responsibility on the matter ? " See that ye refuse 
not Him that speaketh ; for if they escaped not who 
refused Him that spake on earth, much more shall not we 
escape if we turn away from Him that speaketh from 
heaven." 

We must now advance a step farther, and inquire whether 
the teaching of Scripture is in harmony with the conclu- 
sions of philosophy and the ascertained results of human 
experience. Is man in the matter of belief a mere automa- 
ton, possessed of no control over the actings of his intelli- 
gence, actuated in the formation of his judgment solely by 
pure intellect, and not liable to be influenced by a thousand 
varying feelings, nor to be swayed by strong prejudices — 
never subject to fitful passions, nor to powerful inclinations 
that influence all the processes of his intellectual life ? Is 
there no element at work, when he forms his opinions, but 
facts and evidences .'' and do these, by hard and fast lines, 
shut him up to inevitable and unavoidable conclusions, so 
that he can no more be held accountable for his opinions, 
than a watch is accountable for the figures on the dial at 
which the pointers stand ? 

It is granted that facts and evidences must be the bases 
of all belief — that they are essential elements in the forma- 
tion of all opinions. No man believes anything as a mere 
act of his will, in the absence of all real or supposed 
evidence. The wish may be father to the thought, but 
there will always be the interposition of a something besides 
the wish, that is made the warrant for the conviction, or for 
the alleged belief Hence it may be conceded that, if man 
was nothincc more than an intellectual being, if he had not a 



AFFECTIONS INFLUENCE BELIEF. 19 

moral as well as a mental nature, it might be difficult to 
prove him responsible for his opinions. If an arithmetical 
proposition be presented to us, so that we understand it, we 
viitst acccept it ; that two and eight make ten is a truth 
not in the least dependent on our being willing to receive it 
— the belief is imperative ; and so, if pure intellect was sup- 
posed to be dealing with perfect evidence, it must always 
arrive at one conclusion, and there would be no responsibility. 
But this is not the constitution of man, else there never 
would occur an instance in which error would be espoused, in 
the face of abundant evidence to establish the rejected truth ; 
nor would there ever be occasion to say of any man's belief, 
it is his heart, rather than his head, that misleads him ; 
meaning thereby that a man's latent feelings, and hidden 
inclinations, or wayward habits, had more to do with his 
sentiments and opinions than he himself was aware of, or 
would allow. " Is there," says Dr. Wardlaw, " no recipro- 
cally influential connection between the understanding and 
the affections .'* and, more especially, has the state of the 
latter no influence on the exercise of the former } Who 
that knows anything of even the most ordinary phenomena 
of human nature — phenomena which, so far from being 
recondite, are open to everyone's observation — is not aware 
how weighty is the power of the desires and inclinations 
over the operations of intellect ; to what a vast extent, 
both in the number of instances and in the degree of force, 
opinion and belief are affected by predisposition by the 
previous bent of the will!" If this be accurate — and all 
experience confirms it — then, in so far as any opinions are 
influenced by disposition, by the affections, by the inclina- 
tions, they are the subjects of responsibility. 

The whole question might be discussed from this point — 
Does man exercise any power in the formation of his belief.^ 
and, if so, what is that power, and how is it put forth 1 To 
such questions we answer, man largely chooses and selects 
the subjects of his thought, and acts with perfect freedom 
in collecting the evidence, for and against the question on 
which his opinion is to be formed. He may shun all inquiry 



20 FORMATION OF OPINION LARGELY VOLUNTARY. 

on any subject of which he is ignorant, or on which he is 
ill-informed ; and, if so, this is an act of his will. True, his 
volition could not create satisfactory evidence, but it could 
lead him to investigate the nature and amount of the 
evidence that is available, and give it all due attention. If 
that is not done, is it not his act that keeps the windows 
closed, and thus excludes the glorious light of attainable 
knowledge ? On this subject. Dr. Abercrombie has well 
said — " There are laws of evidence as absolute and im- 
mutable in their nature, as the laws of physical relations. 
But for the operation of them a state of mind is required, 
and without this, even the best evidence may be deprived 
of its power to produce conviction ; for the result of 
evidence on the mind depends on close and continued 
attention ; and ^/iis is a voltmtaiy process, which every one 
may be able to perform. It is on this ground," he adds, 
" that we hold a man to be responsible for his belief, and 
contend that he may incur deep moral guilt by his disbelief 
of moral truths, which he has examined in a frivolous or 
prejudiced manner ; or which perhaps he indulges in the 
miserable affectation of disbelieving, without having exa- 
mined them at all." In fact, it is well known that, as regards 
every opinion to which there are two sides, there will be 
arguments, more or less cogent, for and against it. These 
should be sought out by a candid inquirer — be examined and 
weighed by him. Man's action in this is wholly voluntary, 
and therefore it can be the subject either of praise or of 
blame. He can neglect this duty entirely, or he can 
perform it partially, or he can do it candidly and earnestly. 
He may lean to the one side, so as not to see the argu- 
ment on the other, striving to find out everything which 
strengthens his preconceived notions, and through negli- 
gence or design overlooking or refusing to consider all that 
favours a different sentiment. Surely, in this most common 
procedure, there is a moral wrong done, and culpability 
incurred. 

Who does not know that the influence of argument or 
evidence, in creating belief, does not depend altogether on 



FEELINGS INFLUENCE OUR JUDGMENTS. 21 

its own force or weight, but largely on the degree of atten- 
tion that is given to it ; so that, if calm and deliberate 
reflection is paid to one statement, while little attention is 
given to the other, the inevitable consequence will be this — 
the mind will lean to the side to which the attention has 
been given, and a very erroneous judgment may be the 
result. 

All who are acquainted with the laws that regulate the 
human mind, are aware that a man's self-interests and pre- 
judices, his appetites and passions, his pride of consistency, 
or his repugnance to acknowledge former error, will often 
drive him pertinaciously to cling to opinions in the face of 
evidence to the contrary, which everyone sees but himself 
In such cases, the beliefs are warped to that side where 
inclination points, and swayed as humour, or pleasure, or 
passion direct, so that the belief seems true that is pleasant 
and grateful. Would it not, then, be plainly absurd to 
assert that the man has no control over his opinions, or 
that he was wholly passive as to the impressions made on 
his understanding ? * 

The error on this subject arises largely from overlooking 
the structure of the human mind, and from forgetting that 
conscience and moral feelings are integral parts of the con- 
stitution of man. It is in virtue of this constitution that 
moral feelings alter and modify, direct and control, the 
actings of the intellect, and thereby attach to them their 
responsibility. All through the processes of thought and 
the attainment of belief, it is t/ie vian who acts — never 
ceasing to be a moral agent, and, as such, ever accountable 
to a higher power — not in one department of life or action 
only, but in all. It would be a hard, I believe an impossible 

* " Whatever may be thought of belief or unbehef, it can never be 
questioned that there may be a contracting of guilt by the refusal or 
the neglect to attend to evidence. The degree of this guilt must be 
in proportion to the intrinsic magnitude of the subject, the authority 
under which it presents itself, and the importance of the consequences 
depending on the determination of the question at issue. Now there 
is a host of unthinking sceptics, or uninquiring infidels, who have never 
considered, never examined. They are without excuse." — Wardlaw. 



99 



FEELINGS AFFECT OUR JUDGMENTS. 



task, to separate, by any process of analysis, what is purely 
mental from what is purely moral, in any jndgment or con- 
clusion on moral questions ; for the workings of our mental 
and moral nature are so interleaved and interwoven, that we 
cannot extricate the one completely from the other, nor 
absolutely prevent our feelings from entering into the 
chamber of our thoughts. Take, for example, the case of a 
man who is either judge or juror in a case of trial : his ear- 
nest desire is to decide and determine according to evi- 
dence, and to keep his mind free and uninfluenced by any 
prejudice, either for or against the prisoner. Can he be as 
impassive as the bench on which he sits — as calm and cool, 
and as free from the influence of all environments, as if 
he were reading in his study, the history of a trial that had 
occurred a hundred years ago t Will the appearance of 
the prisoner, the knowledge of his previous life, the very 
character of the crime with which he is charged, the great- 
ness of the issue as concerns the accused, and the impas- 
sioned appeals of the counsel to his heart and conscience, 
import no feeling into the case.'* and will he retire to form 
and frame his verdict with as little concern, and with as 
little emotion, as he would sit down to a question in 
arithmetic, or to solve a problem in Euclid } The thing is 
impossible. The fact is, that the union of heart and 
conscience, of will and mind in man, carries into all mental 
transactions a moral character, and thereby involves the 
element of responsibility. 

Nor would this statement be complete if we did not add 
that the conscience takes cognisance of opinion and belief; 
and wherever conscience judges, there must necessarily be 
accountableness. What more common, in the intercourse of 
human life, than the expressions — I am conscientiously of 
opinion; or, I hold this opinion conscientiously; my belief is 
a matter of conscience, I am bound by it, I cannot change 
it. And if this language be correct, it admits all that is con- 
tended for ; for conscience deals with voluntary actings, 
and is indissolubly associated with them exclusively. " It 
has never, perhaps, been observed," says Sir Jas. M'Intosh, 



CONSCIENCE TAKES COGNISANCE OF BELIEFS. 23 

in his treatise on Ethics, "that an operation of conscience 
precedes all acts deliberate enough to be, in the highest 
sense, voluntary, and does so as much when it is defeated 
as when it prevails. Conscience has no object but a state 
of the will ; and, as as an act of will, is the sole means of 
gratifying any passion. Conscience is co-extensive with 
the whole man ; and, without encroachment, curbs or aids 
every feeling, even within the peculiar province of that 
feeling itself. It seems, therefore, clear that conscience 
takes cognisance of all voluntary acts, and must be univer- 
sal and independent." It is not at all necessary, here, to 
discuss the question — Are reason and conscience separate 
faculties of man ; or are they different names for one attri- 
bute of mind, acting on distinct objects, and under different 
circumstances ? As a part of our moral nature, the mind 
recognises a distinction between good and evil, between 
right and wrong ; it pronounces as certainly on these two 
qualities as it does on two quantities, where the question- is 
one of number or of magnitude. It may be that we cannot 
explain the ground of the conclusion thus arrived at — that 
it belongs to the intuitions of the heart, and must be traced 
back to the moral nature of God, the impress of which was 
originally enstamped on man's being. It might, therefore, be 
said, without entering on the metaphysics of the subject, that 
conscience is the capacity to perceive the right, and to be 
affected by the moral emotion which accompanies that per- 
ception. Now the state and condition of a man's conscience 
depends largely on himself He can render it frigid, inac- 
tive, perverse, or tender, acute, and sensitive; and, according 
to its state, so will be its influence over the mental and 
emotional state of man. A right state of the conscience 
admits of the understanding being free and unfettered, 
and therefore allows it to form its opinions more correctly. 
This mutual influence of the moral sense on the mental 
economy is part of our constitution ; for as far as observa- 
tion extends, every rational creature has a conscience ;* and 

* Each animal has its instincts implanted by nature to direct him to 
his greatest good. Man has his — an instinctive approbation of right 



24 CONSCIENCE JUDGES OPINIONS. 

every creature endowed with conscience is a rational being ; 
the conscience in all men intuitively recognises some law 
superior to itself, the force and authority of which it can 
neither evade nor modify. Under the influence of that law, 
conscience takes note of all the free actings of man in the 
world of thought, in the world of motive, in the world ot 
desire, as in the world of overt acts, and of fulfilled purposes. 
At the same time, it must be remembered that reason and 
conscience act together ; that there is not within man one 
thmkiiig engine that works by itself, and another moral 
engine that takes up the products of the thinking, and weaves 
them into new forms and fashions ; the conscience always 
acts with the reason, and gives the moral colouring to its 
fabrics. 

Now, while it is true that the conscience is not an 
unerring guide, and is not invariable, nor infallible, in its 
judgments, any more than reason is in its conclusions, it is, 
nevertheless, true that in society, where the members have 
different degrees of mental culture, and are endowed with 
different sensibilities, and hold different opinions, we do 
conscientiously judge of the sentiments and beliefs of each 
other, and, without any hesitation, pronounce this to be 
right, and that to be wrong ; we must do so, standing on our 
own moral convictions, and maintaining the honour and 
authority of our consciences. And if we can deal thus with 
the sentiments and beliefs of other men, have we not greater 
facilities, and much more reason, for dealing thus with our 
own } and, in approving or disapproving of them, do we not 
recognise our responsibility 1 If we can meditate on the 
errors in opinion of other men, and conclude that, if we 
had been in their position, we would have judged differently, 
why may we not sit in judgment on our own beliefs, and 

and abhorrence of wrong, prior to all reflection on their nature or their 
consequences. — Warbiirtoii. 

Every bias, instinct, propension within, is a real part of our nature, 
but not the whole ; add to them the superior faculty, whose office it is 
to adjust, manage, and preside over them ; and take in this, its natural 
superiority, and you complete the idea of human nature. — Butler. 




ALL CONSCIENCES DO NOT JUDGE ALIKE. 25 

acknowledge that we have often neglected evidence, have 
often avoided the perception of truth, because we did not 
wish to see it ; or, if we did look at it, interposed the coloured 
glasses of strong prejudice, and therefore could not be 
convinced, because we would not? This propensity has 
embodied itself in the well-known proverb — " None are so 
blind as those who won't see." 

It does not follow from this that all men must think alike 
or judge aright — that the consciences of all men will arrive 
at one and the same conclusion on all subjects. As it is in 
nature, so it is in life. All flowers do not grow alike — all do 
not assume the same forms, nor exhibit the same shades of 
colour, nor do they all make the same impression on the 
beholders ; the varieties are infinite, but that adds to the 
general beauty of the landscape. So, in the human soul, 
you will scarcely ever find two judgments absolutely the 
same ; the minds are not of the same calibre, nor the moral 
senses equally tender and delicate ; and, therefore, while it 
is the duty of every man to cultivate an enlightened con- 
science, and to be fully persuaded in his own mind, he 
should make allowance for the conscientious convictions of 
others. But that whole process involves the idea of respon- 
sibility for opinion, though, of course, it is a responsibility 
to God, and not to man. "Through the conscience," says 
Dr. Lee, " we behold that which is the most august aspect 
of the Divine nature, and the noblest attribute of our own. 
Resistance to that law which speaks through the conscience, 
is, therefore, as much rebellion against human nature as against 
the Divine government; and where there is rebellion, there is 
assuredly responsibility." Very likely it will be replied to 
all this — There is nothing in this argument ; for the utter- 
ances of conscience are very different in different men, 
and among different nations, and therefore the distinctions 
between right and wrong are altogether arbitrary. But 
surely the fact that the moral sense may be corrupted and 
vitiated by sin, till a man, imbruted by vice, feels no more 
the pangs of remorse over his brutality, than the lion or the 
bear do when gloating over the mangled remains of their 



26 ARGUMENT FROM PHILOSOPHY AND EXPERIENCE. 



victim, is no proof that conscience does not exist ; it would 
be just as wise and correct to say that man is not a rational 
being, because cases can be produced in which the lower 
and more debasing appetites have so broken up the reason- 
ing faculty, that it is hard to dig out the fragments of it 
from the debris and desolation with which vice has overlaid 
it. The machine is all in ruins; but the broken wheels 
and dislocated connecting-rods are sufficient to prove the 
original purpose of the great Architect ; in short, there is 
enough, even in the ruins of man's moral nature, to show 
that conscience is a part of his constitution, that it judges 
his opinions, informs him that he is a free agent, and there- 
fore responsible to God for what he thinks and believes. 

Finally, philosophy and experience attest that there is a 
necessary and uniform connection between belief and prac- 
tice, and that to absolve a man from all responsibility for 
his belief would render him to a large extent unaccountable 
for what he did or said. The entire life of man is composed 
of these three things — thought, feeling, action. Knowledge 
supplies the food for thought, and feeling provides the motive 
for action. Belief is consequently an active principle that 
displays its power in all the walks of life ; and more 
especially in the highest walks, wherein deeds of moral 
heroism have mantled with dignity the memories of the 
illustrious. Take the case of two nations. In the one there 
is a general belief in the existence and perfection of Jehovah, 
in the rectitude of His laws and in the benevolence of His 
government, in the duty of obeying His statutes and of 
glorifying His name ; in the other there is a general belief in 
false gods — in Jupiter, or Juno, or Venus, or Shiva, or Vishnu. 
These are to be worshipped and served with sacrifices and 
offerings agreeable to their nature. Are these beliefs harm- 
less } Will they remain dead and stagnant in the intellect .-^ 
or will they, must they be operative in and over the life } Let 
history and experience tell. ] n the one nation they produce a 
certain amount of holy fear, of virtue and morality ; the 
worship that is practised and the lives that are led are some- 
what in harmony with the ideas that have been formed ; they 



OPINIONS INFLUENCE PRACTICE. 27 

run out in the same plane with their thoughts of Jehovah, and, 
in proportion as they accord therewith, we call them virtuous 
or good, for the opinion and the practice are inseparable 
in their character. In the other case, the belief in false 
divinities leads, and always has led, to demoralised actions, 
which we term sinful and evil. The Hindoo drowns his 
aged parent in the Gunga ; the Moabite makes his child to 
pass through the fire to Moloch ; the worshippers of Venus 
indulge in unmentionable licentiousness ; the Indian leaves 
the aged and infirm to starve to death in the woods ; the 
altars are stained with human blood; infanticide becomes 
a duty, and is elevated into the rank of a virtue. Now if 
man has no control over his opinions and beliefs, he can 
have none over the actions that necessarily result from 
them ; and we are not warranted in pronouncing any con- 
demnation on those who commit such or similar crimes. 
The world is not old enough yet to have forgotten the 
triumphs of infidelity in France in the end of the last cen- 
tury, and the actions resulting therefrom in the terrific 
scenes of the revolutionary period ; nor is it so courteous as to 
allow that there is no moral evil in holding communistic and 
socialistic opinions, and no risk that society would be con- 
vulsed to its centre if such opinions were entertained by 
the masses of the people. 

If the principle that man has no control over his opinions 
in morals and religion be true, it is equally true that he has 
no control over his opinions in the common affairs of life ; 
and if opinion be the basis, the guide, the spirit of action, 
irresponsibility would become the law of human life ; the 
distinction between virtue and vice would soon be lost sight 
of, and disorganised society become the curse of the earth. 
It was not a forced nor a necessary conviction, but one to 
which the free consent of a man's whole soul was given, that 
inspired and led to the noble deeds that stand emblazoned 
in records human and Divine. The men who have done 
honour to their race have been the first and foremost to 
recognise the connection between their belief and their 
actions. The belief led to the action, and carried them to 



28 OPINION AND PRACTICE INSEPARABLE. 

the triumphant issue of their conflicts, in the face of a 
thousand perils, and of all but insurmountable difficulties. 

Look at that intrepid man who, year after year, besieged 
the courts and crowned heads of Europe, beseeching them 
to send him forth on a voyage of discovery. He believed 
in the existence of an unknown country; he had formed the 
strong opinion that it could be reached, and it became his 
life-work to reach that land ; and not the dangers of 
unknown seas, not the mutinies of his sailors, not the thought 
of starvation and death, could deter his noble spirit. His 
belief was a power within him ; it made him victor in the 
end ; and the name of Columbus will never be forgotten till 
the time has come when there shall be no more sea. 

But why speak of deeds like his when we have illustra- 
tions nobler far. In that record of heroes in the eleventh 
chapter of the Epistle to the Hebrews, we have the story of 
the men Avho subdued kingdoms, wrought righteousness, 
obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions — the men of 
whom the world was not worthy, the grand pioneers in the 
noble army of martyrs. There, see belief in action. The faith 
within is clothed upon with visibility — heroic wills, power- 
ful to endure all the world's malice ; for the men knew in 
whom they believed ; and that faith, with its acknowledged 
responsibilities, led them to their sacrifices, and animated 
their hearts to dare and endure all things for their Lord. 
And what do their lives and lessons teach us but this, that 
belief is an energetic principle of action, and Christian belief 
the most powerful and energetic of all ? 

But when we say that opinions necessarily develope into 
actions, as seed developes into a plant, and that accountable- 
ness must follow the process all through ; that if a man does 
not believe in a world to come, in a state of future and final 
retribution, his life will be very different from that of a 
Christian, who thinks and walks, as seeing God who is in- 
visible ; we are met by the reply — We can produce men who 
deny all the cardinal doctrines of Christianity ; yea, who 
dispute the very existence of God and of a hereafter ; who 
are as amiable and gentle, as loving and upright, as the best 



CONCLUSION. 29 

among those who speak most freely of having believed in 
God, and of loving Him with all their hearts. It may be so, 
but where are they found ? — in the midst of Christian society, 
surrounded with all the indirect benefits of Christian nurture 
and education, largely fashioned and moulded by the very 
beliefs they now reject or vilify. 

Look at the atheist, when he is separate from the indirect 
influences of Christianity, in his native dress, with all the 
surroundings that his own opinions have called into being, 
or have failed to control. See him in Ancient Rome in the 
days of the Apostle Paul, and in the history and character 
of the vices and crimes that disgraced the imperial city, as 
recorded in the first chapter of the Epistle to the Romans ; 
see the spawn which that philosophy spread over the waters 
of life, and the pollutions which, if it did not produce, it at 
all events failed to remedy or remove. See him in Ancient 
Greece, in Ephesus, and Corinth ; and learn that Epicurus 
and his Stoics could not bear to be placed on the same 
platform with the humblest followers of Jesus, and have 
their moralities compared and contrasted even by the 
philosophic atheists of modern days. The practice in both 
cases would be at once the result and the exponent of the 
faiths. 

No responsibility for opinion ! Call up the spirits of 
the persecutors of the Church of God — the men who slew 
the saints for the testimony they held, and against whom 
the souls of the martyred cried from under the altar, " How 
long, O Lord, holy and true, dost Thou not judge and 
avenge our blood on them that dwell on the earth .^" and 
tell those spirits that society, which now execrates their 
opinions and their crimes, has done them great injustice ; 
that in believing that it was for the honour of God that 
heretics should be tortured, hunted like wild beasts from 
the earth, and put to the crudest deaths, their opinion was 
wrong, but as they held it honestly and sincerely, they 
are not condemnable for having entertained it, and that the 
practical carrying it out was as inevitable as the opinion 
itself; and if they could believe you, it would mitigate the 



30 CONCLUSION. 

anguish of their remorse, and help to quiet a little their 
terrible forebodings of the coming judgment. 

Not responsible for belief! Will the British Government 
teach that doctrine to the Thugs of India, who believe that 
in murdering the unwary traveller they are guilty of no 
crime ? Not responsible for belief! Will humanity permit 
the young widow to mount the funeral pile, and be consumed 
with the body of her deceased husband, because she believes 
such sacrifice is required, and is her passport for heaven ^ 
Not responsible for belief! Will a parent preach that 
doctrine to a prodigal son, who has wasted his substance 
with riotous living ? Will he address him thus — I think 
you have acted sinfully and shamelessly, bringing disgrace 
on yourself and on your father's house ; but knowing that 
you believe that the course you are pursuing is the most 
pleasurable — that you do not see the evdl of it as I do — that 
you believe that there is more happiness to be had in the 
companionships you have chosen than in the peace and 
quietude of home, I pity you, but I cannot condemn you, 
because you have no power over the belief in which you act .'' 

Not responsible for belief! Will a judge teach that 
to a convicted thief at his tribunal ^ Will he say — The 
evidence against you is full, clear, and undeniable ; I must 
pronounce you guilty ; but I cannot blame you ; you don't 
believe in the rights of property ; you cannot see any reason 
why some men should possess wealth and comfort in abun- 
dance, and you should want both ; and you see no harm 
in filching a part of their superfluous store, if you can do it 
without detection — that is your belief; it is a very erroneous 
one, but you cannot help it ; and it is very sad that law, 
with its austerity, compels me to pass a sentence upon you 
for an act which was the necessary and the natural result 
of opinion and belief you could not control .'' Would 
common sense, would the interests of society tolerate such J 
jargon ? Reason and philosophy might not be able to i 
solve the connection between opinion and practice, and % 
yet both would maintain, at least in all the ordinary afTairs 
of human life, that man is responsible for his deeds. Any ' 



i 



CONCLUSION. 31 

other sentiment would arrest all social improvement, sap 
the foundations of all morality, and enable the wicked to 
find a justification for every crime ; for if a man's opinion 
is to be his standard of honesty and his test of virtue, 
religion might at once spread out her snow-white wings, and, 
soaring off to a world of purity and love, leave the earth a 
prey to darkness and to death. 

Perhaps it will be said that, in all cases where the opinions 
result in criminal practices, the beliefs formed were not war- 
ranted by evidence. But if the man is not responsible, who 
is to judge ? The question is not how the evidence would 
affect j^//r mind, but how it has affected /as, and determined 
his procedure ; for the power of evidence varies immensely 
according to the men and the minds it is presented to. 
Argument, cogent and apparently irresistible, is no evidence 
to a man whose soul is vitiated by sin, or whose under- 
standing is clouded by superstition. Even facts are not 
evidence to a man who does not perceive them, and whose 
non-perception is due to the state of his own heart and will. 
The conclusion of the whole matter is this — What we 
believe determines what we do, and thus the responsibility 
covers the whole area of opinion and of practice. 

These are not the times in which there is occasion to 
lessen man's sense of accountability to God. Men's wits 
are sharp enough to frame excuses for their sins, and to fancy 
that they cannot avoid thinking and doing what they wish 
to think and delight to practise. What is needed in these 
eventful days is the plain and forcible teaching of the fact 
that man has a conscience, which will one day awake, and 
from its tribunal in the soul judge of thoughts and deeds, and 
prove in the bitter experience of the condemned that that 
silent monitor, like a bird of prey, has followed him in all 
the walks of life, with its terrible retributions and indescrib- 
able forebodings of wrath. Vain, vain will ever be the 
task of trying to divest man's mind of the thought of a 
coming day of retribution ; for the idea of that future 
judgment, which is to vindicate the moral government of 
God, and explain all that seems anomalous in the workings 



32 CONCLUSION. 

of His providence, flashes upon us every hour of our 
existence. The lessons of history, the aspects of society, 
the prevalence of evil, the depression of the godly, the long- 
continued and God-dishonouring sentiments that have 
prevailed in the world, demand a day of trial — a day in 
which the claims of truth will be vindicated as certainly as 
the claims of righteousness, and a judgment be passed that 
will include all error, as well as all criminality. Oh, blessed 
thought ! before that hour arrives, knowledge will have 
spread over the earth as the light of day spreads over the 
world, false opinion will have lost its foothold in time, 
human thought will have achieved its noblest triumphs, 
right beliefs, in union with piety and charity and love, will 
be commanding influences in all climes and kingdoms, and 
all the ends of the earth be found rejoicing in the faith 
that saves, and in the truth that sanctifies. 



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Wfi^ Sfr mA ^\\mmk\ 4 0{lti[ist. 



REV. JOHN MORAN. 



LIFE AND CHARACTER OF CHRIST. 



-♦♦•♦♦- 



THE evidences of the truth of Christianity are manifold 
and varied, addressing themselves not only to different 
types of mind, but also to different parts of our mental and 
moral nature. One of the strongest and most convincing 
of these is to be found in the life and character of Christ as 
portrayed in the gospels. To set forth the nature and value 
of this evidence is the object of the present lecture. In the 
time at our disposal it will not be possible to do more than 
give an outline of the argument derivable from this source. 

We have in our hands four writings or compositions, 
generally known as "The Gospels;" and according to the 
present results of criticism, the first of these was in existence 
before A.D. 70, the second and third some few years later, 
and the fourth about the close of the first century.* We do 
not assume the truth of these writings, for that would be to 
take for granted the matter in dispute, but simply that they 
now exist, and that they can be traced back to the dates 
that have been mentioned. 

When we examine these compositions, we find that they 
are memoirs or biographies of a remarkable person called 
Jesus Christ, and that they represent him as possessing a 
character transcendently excellent and beautiful, faultlessly 
pure and perfect, unique and unparalleled in history. They 
do this, not by any formal description or delineation of his 
character — nothing of that kind is attempted — but by the 
simple record of what he said and did. Our limits forbid 
anything but a mere sketch of the character thus set 
before us ; and no such sketch can do it anything like 
justice. Indeed, no delineation or description can — nothing 
but the gospel narratives themselves. 

These memoirs introduce us to this remarkable person 

* Christlieb's " Modern Doubt and Christian Belief," p. 395. 



4 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF CHRIST. 

in his infancy. After intimation, by an angel, to his 
mother of his birth and of the name by which he should 
be called, he is miraculously conceived through the power 
of the Holy Ghost (such is the representation), and is born 
a " Holy Thing." He is born in a stable and laid in a man- 
ger, yet an angel from heaven announces his birth to men, 
and a multitude of the heavenly host praise God for his 
appearance in our world. And thus we meet at the very 
commencement of his earthly life that combination of great- 
ness and lowliness, dignity and abasement, which marks it 
throughout and distinguishes it from every other life. 

The child Jesus is not a prodigy, displaying superhuman 
wisdom and doing wonderful things from his very infancy. 
He is a perfectly natural and truly human child, but pure 
and holy, without any taint of evil or any stain of sin. He 
grows like other children, both physically and mentally, in 
stature and in inteUigence. He attracts the affection of all 
who come in contact with him, and has favour with God, 
whose grace is upon him. 

This is the picture given us of his infancy. Of his boy- 
hood we have but a glimpse — one recorded incident, but 
it is in harmony with the childhood that has preceded. 
When twelve years of age, he goes up to Jerusalem with 
his parents, and is left behind there at their departure. 
When they return to seek him, they find him " in the 
temple, sitting in the midst of the doctors, both hearing 
them and asking them questions " — the impression made 
upon all Avho hear him being one of amazement " at 
his understanding and answers." There is nothing in his 
conduct or bearing to offend — no pertness nor forwardness, 
no want of modesty or humility ; yet he shows a measure of 
inteUigence and an interest in Divine things so far beyond 
those of an ordinary and merely human youth, that those who 
hear him are " astonished." His mother gently reproaches 
him for having remained behind his father and herself with- 
out their knowledge, and thereby caused them anxiety on 
his account : and then we have that first recorded word of 
his — "Wist ye not that I must be about my Father's busi- 



HIS SPOTLESS CHILDHOOD. 5 

ness?" — the "solitary floweret plucked out of the enclosed 
garden of the thirty years," which shows us that he had 
come to know himself and his relation to the Father — a 
knowledge which surprised his mother, and which, not under- 
standing, she carried away to meditate on and ponder. 

Now it has been well shown by Bushnell that, whether 
fact or fiction, we have here the sketch of a perfect and 
sacred childhood — that, in this respect, the early character 
of Jesus is a picture that stands by itself — that in no other 
case has a biographer, in drawing a character, represented 
it as beginning with a spotless childhood. He adds — " If 
any writer, of almost any age, will undertake to describe 
not merely a spotless but a superhuman or celestial child- 
hood, not having the reality before him, he must be some- 
what more than human himself, if he does not pile together 
a mass of clumsy exaggerations, and draw and overdraw, 
till neither heaven nor earth can find any verisimilitude in 
the picture."* This is strikingly exhibited by the apocry- 
phal gospels in their portraiture of Christ's childhood. 
While the writers of the gospels we are considering say so 
little of the infancy and youth of Jesus, and expressly tell 
us that he did his first miracle at Cana of Galilee when 
entering upon his public ministry, the apocryphal gospels 
fill his childhood and youth with all manner of grotesque 
and absurd miracles and prodigies, showing us what it was 
in the power of that age to invent, and in what a contrast it 
stands to the naturalness and reserve of the canonical gospels. 

When we pass from Christ's childhood to his manhood, 
and consider his character as it is then presented to us, we 
find that it is just the development of his pure and spotless 
youth, to which it stands in the same relation as the flower 
does to the bud from which it has expanded. 

As we survey this character, the first thing that strikes us 
is its perfect innocence and sinlessness. According to the 
representation given of him in the gospels, Jesus Christ is a 
perfectly innocent and sinless being. During his whole life, 
he neither does wrong, nor gives just cause of offence to 
* " Nature and the Supernatural," p. 280. 



6 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF CHRIST. 

any one. He never injures any one, by word or deed. 
Many, no doubt, are offended with him, but it is with what 
is good in him that they are offended — with his faithfulness 
and truth, his purity and holiness, his compassion and 
benevolence. The Scribes and Pharisees are offended with 
his humility because it rebukes their pride, with his bene- 
volence because it reproves their selfishness, with his holi- 
ness because it contrasts so strongly with their moral turpi- 
tude and vileness. But this is their blame ; he is blameless. 
The idea of Christ, in this respect, conveyed by the gospel 
narrative, is that of a perfectly innocent and harmless being, 
one whose life is altogether inoffensive, and to whose heart 
every feeling of hatred and unkindness is a stranger. 
And, while thus innocent and harmless, he is so without 
sustaining any loss of dignity — without giving any idea of 
feebleness or weakness, such as we often associate with 
mere innocence — nay, while conveying the strongest im- 
pression of greatness and power. 

Nor is Christ innocent and harmless merely; he is sinless. 
This, we are aware, is denied by some ; but we contend that 
it is the representation of the gospel narrative. There is 
no act attributed to him that can, with any show of justice, 
be regarded as a sinful act. His driving of the traffickers 
out of the temple, especially when taken in connection with 
his claim as Son to rule in his Father's house, is an act 
not only compatible with sinlessness, but positively holy 
and even godlike in its character. And the fact that so 
many retire without resistance before a single man, implies 
a consciousness of wrong-doing upon their part, and shows > 
the majesty of reproving holiness. As to the charge of ' 
injustice and unreasonable resentment, founded on his v 
smiting a fig-tree with barrenness, it is almost unworthy of '!■ 
serious refutation. There was no injustice and no resent- j 
ment in the case. It was a warning expressed in symbol, j 
an admonition given by an act. It was Christ's taking an * 
inanimate object — and, therefore, one that was incapable of 
suffering — and using it to reprove the people of Israel for ■ 
their unfruitfulness, and warn them of impending doom. 



HIS SINLESSNESS. 7 

Then we have most important testimony on this point 
borne by Christ's enemies. Pilate washes his hands before 
the multitude, in token of his freedom from all participation 
in the crime of putting an innocent man to death ; and says, 
" I am innocent of the blood of this just person." Judas, 
who knew what Christ was, not only in public but in private,. 
so far from having anything to allege against him that 
might have excused him to himself and others for what he 
had done, testifies to his innocence, and says, " I have sinned 
in that I have betrayed the innocent blood." 

And what shall we say of Christ's own declarations 
respecting himself ? That he claims to be a perfectly sin- 
less being is undeniable. His challenge to his enemies is, 
"Which of you convinceth me of sin .''" Of his invulner- 
ability to the assaults of Satan, he declares, " The prince of 
this world cometh and hath nothing in me;" and of his 
obedience to the Father, he says, " I do always the things 
that please him." And not only does he make this claim ; 
he carries it through without faltering in its assertion, or 
abating it for a single moment. During his whole life 
he never makes a confession of sin, drops a tear of peni- 
tence, nor offers a prayer for forgiveness. He has no 
remorse, no regrets, no sense of having failed in any duty — 
no feeling that he should have done anything different, or 
in a different manner, from what he has done. " It is clear," 
as Dorner says, " in the most decided moments of his life, 
that he is conscious of no sin. That his self-consciousness 
was really of such a sort that his conscience never accused 
him of any fault or error, is the firmest and most indis- 
putable historical fact, explain it as we may. That he 
imposed upon himself as his life-task the salvation and 
reconciliation of the world ; that he was conscious, too, of 
being occupied with the solution of this problem, in suffer- 
ing even to the cross ; and that he died in the full 
consciousness of having solved the problem, as well as of 
unbroken communion with God, is just as undeniable as 
that it would have been an insane and absurd thought to 
wish to redeem and reconcile others, if he had been con- 



8 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF CHRIST. 

scious of needing redemption himself. How, then, can the 
phenomenon be explained, that he, to whom even sceptics do 
not deny the rarest measure of purity and clearness of mind, 
stands before us without being conscious of a single sin, or 
of the necessity of conversion and amendment, which he 
requires of all others ; if not in this way, that he was 
conscious of no sin because he was not a sinner." This is 
the only adequate explanation of it : for as Bushnell has 
well said, " If Jesus was a sinner, he was conscious of sin, 
as all sinners are, and therefore was a hypocrite in the 
whole fabric of his character ; realising so much of Divine 
beauty in it, maintaining the show of such unfaltering 
harmony and celestial grace, and doing all this with a mind 
confused and fouled by the affectations acted for true 
virtues ! Such an example of successful hypocrisy would be 
itself the greatest miracle ever heard of in the world." 

No ; Christ lived in a world where he was exposed and 
tempted to evil, but the purity of his nature constantly 
repelled it. As he touched the leper, and no uncleanness 
followed, so he mingled with sinners and received no con- 
tamination from them. He had evil suggested to his mind 
by Satan, but his holy soul did not admit it. " He did no 
sin, neither was guile found in his mouth." He was " holy, 
harmless, undefiled, and separate from sinners." And in this 
sinlessness of Jesus, in the midst of a sinful world, we have 
something that separates him from all other men, in which 
he stands solitary and alone, the one sublime exception to 
a universal sinfulness. 

But not only is Christ free from all stain of sin ; he is 
distinguished by the highest positive moral excellence, even 
perfect love to God, and pure, disinterested, self-sacrificing 
love to man. This love is the groundwork of his character, 
its grand distinguishing peculiarity. He shows his love to 
God by a regard to His will in all things — a constant, cheer- 
ful, devoted obedience. At twelve years of age, as a matter 
not more of duty than of delight, he must be about his 
Father's business. As he fulfils his ministry, it is his meat, 
the joy and invigoration of his soul, to do the will of Him 



HIS LOVE TO MAN. 9 

that sent him, and to finish His work. And when his earthly 
life is closing, he contemplates it with satisfaction, because he 
can say to the Father — " I have glorified Thee on the earth ; 
I have finished the work which Thou gavest me to do." 

And what shall we say of his love to man, but that the 
world has never witnessed anything like it before or since. 
His whole life on earth was just the expression of that love 
— the shedding of its light on the world's darkness, the 
pouring of its life-giving and healing waters on the world's 
barrenness and drought. This love showed itself in his 
tender sympathy with all human woe — with the deprivations 
of the blind, the heart-sorrows of the bereaved, the infatuation 
of the erring. How he pitied the widowed mother of Nain 
in her bereavement, the sisters of Bethany in their grief, 
his disciples when they sorrowed in the prospect of his 
departure, the inhabitants of Jerusalem in their sinful and 
infatuated rejection of himself! 

Nor was his an empty and barren sympathy, but one 
accompanied and made efficacious by an active benevolence. 
"" He went about continually doing good, healing all man- 
ner of sickness and all manner of disease among the people." 
He declared that he " came not to be ministered unto, but 
to minister, and to give his life a ransom for many." And 
he fulfilled this, his own high ideal, at once of his mission 
and of true greatness. His whole life was one constant minis- 
try of self-sacrificing love. He ministered to man in his physi- 
cal and earthly wants, healing the sick, cleansing the lepers, 
opening the eyes of the blind, comforting the sorrowing, 
restoring the dead to life. And he ministered to man in 
spiritual wants. He did so by the gracious words that pro- 
ceeded out of his mouth, his words of compassion and 
tenderness and absolving love. He ministered thus to the 
paralytic, when he said, " Son, be of good cheer, thy sins are 
forgiven thee ;" to the woman who was a sinner, when he said, 
^'Thy faith hath saved thee, go in peace;" and to the woman 
of Samaria, when he revealed himself to her as the Mes- 
siah, and gave her the true water of life. And the crowning 
act, the climax of this ministry of love, was when he 



10 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF CHRIST. 

ascended to Calvary, and there, by a voluntary death of 
agony and shame, gave his life a ransom for many. " Here- 
in, indeed, was love" — greater than ever man has shown. 

To the highest active benevolence Christ united the 
passive virtues. It has been justly remarked that, by 
his life and teaching, Christ has revolutionised the world's 
estimate of these as an element of greatness. Before 
his time, men associated greatness almost entirely with the 
heroic virtues, and regarded meekness under injury, patient 
endurance of wrong, forgiveness of enemies, as little more 
than weaknesses. But Christ, by his example, has taught 
the world not merely that true greatness is compatible 
wath the passive virtues, but that they form an important 
element of it. He exhibited these not only in the 
greater trials of life, but also in what are said to be their 
severest test, its commoner and minor trials. During his 
life he was a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. 
He was so poor that he had no dwelling he could call 
his own. He knew what it was to hunger, to thirst, and to 
be weary. He was misunderstood by his friends, and mis- 
represented and maligned by his enemies. His good was 
evil spoken of, and his works attributed to Satan. His disci- 
ples clung tenaciously to their mistaken views of the Messiah,, 
and were slow to believe all that the prophets had spoken, 
and all that he taught respecting his sufferings and death. 
His words were often watched for ground of accusation 
against him, and plots were formed against his life. But 
amid all this privation, misconception, and opposition, so 
fitted to discourage and provoke, he is never ruffled or 
chafed in spirit, never manifests fretfulness or impatience, 
displeasure or discontent, never complains or murmurs, but 
holds on his way with an unclouded serenity and a sublime 
and undisturbed composure. He is not insensible either to 
physical or mental ills. Exquisitely sensitive both in soul 
and body, he feels these acutely ; but in virtue of his per- 
fect unselfishness, his devotion to the Father, and his love 
to man, he rises above them and possesses his soul in a 
celestial patience. 



I 



HIS MEEKNESS AND PATIENCE. 11 

When we view him in the closing scenes of his earthly 
life, in what is specially called his passion, he presents a 
spectacle of meek endurance of wrong, and of undeserved, 
yet patient and uncomplaining suffering, such as the world 
has never seen. None ever suffered as he did ; but, although 
innocent, he is an uncomplaining sufferer. He is silent in 
the hall of judgment when the mockery of a trial is con- 
ducted for his condemnation — silent when he is blindfolded 
and buffeted, spit on and scourged, ridiculed and crowned 
with thorns — silent when he toils with his cross along the 
road to Calvary, the only word that he utters being one 
not of self-lamentation, but of pitying regard for others, 
" Daughters of Jerusalem, weep not for me, but weep for 
yourselves, and for your children." Well might it be said 
of him, " He is brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as 
a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he openeth not his 
mouth." If, therefore, to suffer even to death uncomplain- 
ingly, being innocent, manifest greatness of soul, none ever 
exhibited such greatness as Jesus of Nazareth. 

Then think of his forgiveness of injury ! When Peter 
came to him on one occasion, and asked, " Lord, how oft 
shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him ? till seven 
times ? " his reply was — " I say not unto thee until seven 
times, but until seventy times seven." And what he thus 
preached he practised. He forgave Peter for denying 
him, Thomas for doubting him, all the disciples for forsaking 
him at his apprehension. Nay, he forgave those who cruci- 
fied him. As they drive the nails into his hands, he raises 
his meek eyes to heaven and prays, " Father, forgive them ; 
for they know not what they do." No wonder that even 
Rousseau felt constrained to say that if Socrates suffered 
and died like a sage, Christ suffered and died like a god. 

And not only did Christ combine the different c/assrs of 
virtues in his character ; he united in himself a// the 
virtues. Unlike any other great man of whom we read — of 
whom the most that could be said was that he possessed 
one or more virtues in a high degree — Christ possessed every 
virtue in its perfection, so that it is not possible to name any 



12 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF CHRIST. 

moral excellence that did not belong to him. He possessed 
these virtues, moreover, in such just proportion, that his 
character was not only complete and full, but in perfect 
equipoise and balance, exquisitely symmetrical and har- 
monious. His love to God was in beautiful accord with his 
love to man. The one of these virtues did not outrun the 
other, or develop itself at its expense, but wrought har- 
moniously with it. And what was true of these fundamental 
elements of character was true of the various virtues into 
which they resolved themselves. In him, love for the race 
co-existed with love for the individual. Shepherd of 
the whole family of man, he could leave the ninety-and- 
nine in the wilderness, and go after the one that was lost. 
With a world upon his hands, he could stand and call one 
blind man to him for healing, converse with and lead to 
faith and repentance one erring woman by the well of 
Jacob, receive one anxious inquirer who comes to him by 
night, and make known to him the way of eternal life. 

The heroic and the gentle virtues met in him. To the 
highest* manly virtue, the courage that could stand un- 
dauntedly against an opposing world, he joined " the 
highest characteristics of womanly virtue — infinite devotion 
and singleness of purpose, the unruffled serenity of a calm 
and gentle spirit, pure and modest feeling in the main- 
tenance of the finest moral distinctions, and the power 
peculiar to women of passive obedience — power to bear, to 
suffer, to forego in unspeakable loyalty." * 

Never were contrasts so blended, and apparent contradic- 
tions so reconciled, as in him. He is grave without being 
gloomy, unworldly without being unsociable, self-denied with- 
out being austere, spiritual without being ascetic, intolerant of 
sin, while gentle and tenderly compassionate to the sinner. 
His dignity is wedded to humility, his zeal guided by wis- 
dom, his enthusiasm joined with calmness and self- 
possession. He is in harmony with himself, with nature, 
with duty, with everything but sin ; and he is so because 
he is in harmony with God — because the law of God is 
* Martensen's " Christian Ethics," p. 252. 



HARMONY OF HIS CHARACTER. 13 

within his heart, and he is filled and pervaded by love to 
him. And in virtue of this inner harmony he does all 
things well. He is never taken by surprise, nor at a loss 
what to do. He is never unprepared for the occasion, or 
unequal to the emergency, but always does the right thing, 
at the right time, and in the right manner. 

He is truly a perfect character, "fairer than the children 
of men." Whatever he may have been in bodily person, he is 
altogether matchless in the beauty of his character. His life 
is a picture, not only without a blot, but without a defective 
line. It is a majestic anthem, running through the whole 
scale of love and service, sounding every chord of thought 
and feeling, and rising to heaven without a discordant note. 

If we view Christ as a teacher, all admit that none ever 
taught as he does. He has not learned in the schools of the 
Rabbis, and yet he speaks with a wisdom which amazes those 
who hear him, and leads them to ask in wonder, " Whence 
knoweth this man letters, having never learned ? Whence 
hath this man this wisdom and these mighty works ?" He 
has had no training as an orator, and yet from the first 
moment he opens his lips to teach, he shews himself to 
be a perfect master of human speech. 

His teaching is not after human methods, but after a 
manner of his own. He does not speculate, nor make 
guesses at truth. He does not reason and infer, build up 
and prove by elaborate process of argumentation or induc- 
tion. He announces rather, and reveals. He speaks that 
which he knows, and testifies that which he has seen. The 
truth lies before him — is within his mind and heart — and 
he simply utters it ; and it is seen and felt to be the truth 
by those who hear. 

His instructions are not imparted in an artificial and 
formal system, but in precepts and statements of truth, 
each of which has often a kind of completeness in itself, and 
which, as they fall from his lips, might be likened to the 
stars as they drop one after another into the evening sky 
and light up the heaven with glory. He teaches, moreover, 
not in the language of the schools, but in that of the com- 



14 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF CHRIST. 

mon people, so that all can understand ; and often in para- 
bles which are pictures of Divine truth, drawn from nature 
and every-day life, and which come home to all hearts, and 
live in the memory for ever. 

When we consider the matter of his teaching — confining 
ourselves at present to his ethical system — we find it to be 
the highest and purest morality — a morality which even 
sceptics and unbelievers acknowledge to be the noblest and 
most perfect that has ever been propounded, and before 
which the world has bowed down for the last eighteen 
hundred years. It is to this effect — " Whatsoever ye would 
that men should do to you, do ye even so to them ;" "Love 
your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them 
that hate you, and pray for them which despitefuUy use you 
and persecute you ; that ye may be the children of your 
Father which is in heaven : for he maketh His sun to rise on 
the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on 
the unjust. . . . Be ye therefore perfect, even as your 
Father which is in heaven is perfect." 

And this teaching is with authority. He speaks not as 
if there was any doubt of the truth of what he says, but 
with the manner of one who is assured and certain, who 
speaks what he knows, and who has a right to declare the 
laws of the kingdom. His teaching is after this manner — 
" Blessed are the poor in spirit, for their's is the kingdom of 
heaven;" "Ye have heard that it hath been said. An eye for 
an eye, and a tooth for a tooth : but I say unto you. That ye 
resist not evil ; " " Heaven and earth shall pass away, but 
my word shall not pass away ; " " The word that I have 
spoken, the same shall judge him in the last day." Well 
might it be said, " Never man spake like this man." And 
well might we ask, and leave the sceptic to reply — " Whence 
hath this man this wisdom.-*" 

Closely connected with Christ's teaching are his claims. 
When we examine these, we find them to be such as have 
never been advanced by any human being before or since. 
Time will permit us to do little more than mention some 
of these. 



1 



HIS CLAIMS. 15 

First of all, then, he declares his humanity, and again 
and again calls himself " the Son of man." But by this 
designation, as applied to himself, he intimates not merely 
that he is a possessor of our nature, a member of the 
human family; but that he is something more than this — 
that he stands in a peculiar relation to the race — that he is 
the Son of man as no other is — the ideal, the representative 
man — the second man, the head of a new humanity — the 
" Son of man" spoken of by Daniel, the destined possessor of 
universal kingdom and dominion. 

But while thus calling Himself the Son of man, he claims 
no less emphatically to be the Son of God. He calls God 
his Father. "All things are delivered unto me of my 
Father." " My Father worketh hitherto, and I work." 
When the High Priest adjures him, by the living God, to 
tell whether he be " the Christ, the Son of God," his un- 
hesitating and unequivocal reply is, "Thou hast said." And 
when he claims to be the Son of God, he claims to be so in 
a high and peculiar sense, a sense in which no mere creature 
can aspire to the title, and which implies the possession of 
the same nature with God. This is clear from the distinc- 
tion which he always makes, in speaking to the disciples, 
between their relation to God and Ids. He never places 
Himself on a level with them in this respect — never says of 
God oitr Father, but my Father and yoicr Father. The 
opening words of the Lord's prayer are no exception to 
this ; for he is there teaching the disciples to pray, and 
does not include himself His language is, " After this 
manner pray jj^^." 

In accordance with this lofty claim he speaks of himself 
as being " from above," having " come from God," having 
"come out from the Father." He places himself on a level 
with the Father, as when he says of the Jews, " They have 
both seen and hated both me and my Father," when he com- 
missions the disciples to baptize in the name of the Father 
and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost ; and when speaking 
of the Father and himself, he says, "We will come unto 
him and make our abode with him." He claims co-ordi- 



16 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF CHRIST. 

nate authority with the Father — " My Father worketh 
hitherto, and I work." And when the Jews take up stones 
to stone him because he called God his Father, and 
thereby, in their view, made himself equal with God, he 
says nothing to intimate that they were wrong in the in- 
ference they had drawn from the claim which he advanced. 
He declares himself "Lord of the Sabbath;" asserts his 
power to forgive sins and to enact the laws of the kingdom ; 
claims to be honoured equally with the Father ; declares 
that the dead shall hear his voice and come forth to life — 
that, as the appointed judge of all, he will come in glory 
and judge all nations — and that men will be accepted or 
rejected according as they have shown love and attachment 
to him as represented by his people, or have disregarded 
and neglected him. He proclaims himself to be " the light 
of the world," " the way, the truth, and the life," by whom 
alone any one can come to the Father — the only one who 
knows the Father, and can make him known to men. He 
invites all who labour and are heavy-laden to come to him 
that he may give them rest — bids all men follow him, and 
forsake everything that they may do so — declares that he 
will draw all men to him. He demands the highest affec- 
tion of the human heart, and avers that whosever loveth 
father or mother more than him is not worthy of him, and 
cannot be his disciple. 

Such are some of the claims of Christ. Every one will 
admit that they are the most wonderful ever made by any 
being. If any man, any merely human teacher, even though 
he were a prophet or an apostle, were to make such claims, 
would he not cover himself with ridicule, and excite either 
the world's pity of his fanaticism, or its indignant scorn of his 
unfounded and arrogant imposture } Imagine any man, even 
one "charged with a special, express, and unique commis- 
sion from God to lead mankind to faith and virtue,"* stand- 
ing forth, and saying, " All power is given unto me in heaven 
and in earth," " I and the Father are one," " He that hath 
seen me hath seen the Father" — holding out hands to a 
■^ J. S. Mill's " Essays on Religion," p. 255. 



HIS UNDERTAKING. 17 

world of sinners, and saying, " Come unto me, all ye that 
labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." 
Imagine, I say, any man doing this, and what would be 
thought of him and his pretensions ? Well, Christ, the meek 
and lowly in heart, makes these pretensions. He makes 
them again and again ; not more, distinctly when " the 
world is going after him," or when he rides in triumph into 
Jerusalem, than when he stands at the bar of Pilate, and 
when he hangs in agony on the accursed tree. He makes 
them not ostentatiously nor in high swelling words, but 
modestly and calmly, yet with the most assured confidence,, 
and without faltering in their assertion for a moment. And 
he not only makes these claims ; he supports them, so that 
they excite neither pity nor ridicule, neither scorn nor in- 
dignation, in the readers of the gospel narratives. On the 
contrary, his pretensions sit gracefully upon him, are felt 
to be in keeping with his wonderful life and works, and in 
no wise incongruous even with his lowliness and humility. 
We may add that these claims have been acknowledged by 
men of every country, of all classes and conditions, of the 
highest culture and of the lowest, and that in ever-increasing 
numbers for the last eighteen hundred years. Here, surely, 
is something wonderful. 

In keeping with Christ's claims is his undertaking. This 
is to establish a kingdom that shall embrace the world, and, 
by redemption and new creation, to make all men members 
of it. He announces it to be the object of his being sent 
into the world — " that the world through him might be 
saved." He declares that if he " be lifted up from the 
earth, he will draw all ^men unto him." And when he 
sends forth his disciples, it is with the commission — " Go 
ye, therefore, and make disciples of all nations." 

Such is the colossal work which he sets before him — 

even to found a universal spiritual kingdom — to reign in 

the hearts of all men — to draw all men to him, and through 

him to the Father; and so to knit anew the broken friendship 

between heaven and earth, and replace our apostate race in 

its original sphere of loving allegiance to its God and Kin 
1? 



(V 

to- 



18 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF CHRIST. 

In the grandeur of this his undertaking, Christ is indeed 
*' the unparalleled in history." None of the great men that 
we read of, no founder of any state or of any religion, ever 
attempted or even conceived such a thing. None of these 
ever attempted to found a religion or an empire that would 
embrace the world. Every one of them, however liberal 
his education, and however enlarged his views, was more or 
less limited in his aim and influence to his own age or nation. 
But Christ proposes to set up a kingdom that shall extend 
to all nations and all ages, that shall not merely be one 
among the kingdoms of the world, but shall embrace them all, 
and unite them in one loving brotherhood. He proposes to 
enter into relation as Redeemer and Restorer, Teacher and 
Example, King and Head — not with a portion of humanity, 
but with the whole of it — not with one nation or people, but 
with the race, that he may give it a new form and course 
of development — may form it into a new community or 
kingdom — a kingdom of redeemed and sanctified men — a 
kingdom of God upon the earth. He, the humble car- 
penter of Nazareth, brought up in the rudest village of 
the rudest and most obscure province of Palestine — who has 
never been out of his own country, except when he was 
carried as an infant into Egypt — who has had no learned 
education — who is without wealth or power, without friends 
or followers, save a few fishermen and tax-gatherers — he 
conceives this mighty project, and addresses himself to its 
execution with a calm and assured confidence of success. 

And if this scheme of Christ is so grand and wondrous 
even in idea, what shall we say of the plan by which he 
proposes to accomplish it, save that it is grander and more 
wondrous still! he does not expect to see his undertaking 
carried to completion, and his kingdom fully established, 
during his earthly life. He knows what is in his people, and 
what is in man, too well for that. He foresees and lays 
his account with opposition and rejection on the part of 
those whom he would redeem and save ; and he forms his 
plan so that these, instead of hindering his work, shall help 
it forward — instead of thwarting and defeating it, shall con- 



HIS WONDROUS PLAN. 19 

tribute to its success. Though his miracles, his teaching, 
and his example should all fail to impress and win men's 
hearts, as he knows they will, he has still another and a 
mightier power in reserve — the power of his self-sacrificing 
love — the power of a death voluntarily endured out of love 
for those whom he came to save, and at their hands. And 
such is the grandeur at once of his conception and of his 
self-sacrificing love, that he contemplates making his death 
at the hands of men the great instrument of their conquest. 
He says to himself in effect, " I will reveal a love of such 
greatness, self-forgetfulness, and self-sacrifice, that men shall 
not be able to resist it — that it shall overcome their enmity, 
awaken their contrition, and take captive their hearts." Such 
is the wonderful and loving thought of Christ. And thus 
out of apparent failure he will bring success, and out of 
men's very hatred and rejection of him he will extract the 
means of overcoming them, and subduing them to himself. 
Surely we may say, alike of the sublime project and of the 
plan for its accomplishment, " This is not the manner of 
men — is not human, but Divine." " For scarcely for a 
righteous man will one die ; yet peradventure for a good 
man some would even dare to die. But God commendeth 
his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ 
died for us." 

Such, though in meagre outline and most inadequate 
delineation, is the Christ of the gospels. May we not say 
with truth that there never was such a character ? There 
is no parallel to it either in history or in fiction. In stain- 
less purity and holiness, in perfect unselfishness and disin- 
terestedness, in grandeur of aim and greatness of self-denial, 
in sublime devotion to God and self-sacrificing love to man, 
it stands solitary and alone, without anything equal or even 
like to it. 

This is admitted even by those from whom the admission 
could scarcely have been expected. " It was reserved for 
Christianity," says Lecky, in his " History of Morals," " to 
present to the world an ideal character, which, throughout 
all the changes of eighteen centuries, has inspired the hearts 



20 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF CHRIST. 

of men with an impassioned love ; has shown itself capable 
of acting- on all ages, nations, temperaments, and condi- 
tions ; has not only been the highest pattern of virtue, but 
the strongest incentive to its practice ; and has exercised so 
deep an influence, that it may be truly said that the simple 
record of three short years of active life has done more to 
regenerate and soften mankind than all the disquisitions of 
philosophers, and all the exhortations of moralists. This 
has, indeed, been the spring of whatever is best and purest 
in the Christian life. Amid all the sins and failings, amid 
all the priestcraft and persecution and fanaticism that has 
defaced the Church, it has preserved in the example and 
character of its Founder an enduring principle of regener- 
ation." 

Now the question comes. How or whence have we this 
remarkable portraiture of character.'' And to this we at once 
reply, We have it, because Jesus Christ, the person spoken 
of, lived and acted as here described. We have his life in 
the gospels, because that life was lived ; his portrait, because 
he sat for it. 

No doubt there are other supposable Avays of accounting 
for the character, some of which have been actually tried. 
It is supposable, for example, that the character of 
Christ has been invented — that it is a fiction, pure and 
simple, as much so as any of the characters in a novel or a 
drama — that he never really lived, and that his disciples or 
other authors of the gospels drew his character from their 
own imaginations. Now it would be easy to show the 
insuperable difficulties of such a view — the moral impos- 
sibility, in fact, of the disciples or other writers of that age 
conceiving such a character as that of Christ, and not only 
conceiving but portraying it, and keeping it consistent and 
cong-ruous with itself over such a wide field of action as that 

o 

described in the gospel history. But it is needless to do 
this. No one now holds this view. No sceptic of any name 
maintains that the Christ of the gospels is a purely fictitious 
character. Another way of accounting for the existence of 
this character is what is called the rationalistic theory- 



HIS CHARACTER NOT FICTITIOUS. 21 

According to this view, Christ lived as the gospels state. 
He was a very remarkable man, and did wonderful things, 
chiefly cures wrought on the sick and the diseased. He 
performed these cures partly by his medical skill, and 
partly, according to some, by a magnetic influence put 
forth on the bodies of his patients ; according to others, 
by a psycological influence exerted on their minds in in- 
spiring them with hope and confidence. His disciples, 
viewing these acts of his through the magnifying glass of 
an intense admiration and an excited fancy, honestly mis- 
took them for miracles, and so described them ; hence the 
account of him that we have in the gospels. The gospel 
narrative is real history, but history so coloured by the 
imagination of the narrators that natural events are trans- 
formed into miracles. What we need to do is to sever 
between the mistaken views and colouring fancies of the 
narrators and the underlying facts. The way to do this is 
to remove everything that is miraculous, because nothing 
such can be true. The great propounder and champion of 
this theory was the late Dr. Paulus of Heidelberg. And 
here is a specimen of his so-called rational interpretation — 
" The glory of the Lord that shone round about the shep- 
herds on the night of the Saviour's birth was probably a 
meteor, or perhaps the rays of a lantern that happened to 
pass by. The tempter in the wilderness was a clever and 
cunning Pharisee, mistaken by the disciples for the devil. 
The changing of the water into wine at Cana was a harm- 
less wedding joke ; the disciples had provided the wine 
beforehand, and the twilight helped to deceive the guests. 
Christ's walking on the sea was a misapprehension on the 
part of the spectators ; he only walked along the shore. He 
stilled the storm on the lake merely in the sense that by his 
calmness he quieted the frightened disciples, and by a happy 
coincidence the winds and the waves ceased from their rag- 
ing at the same time. He healed the blind by means of an 
efficacious eye-salve, whose application escaped the notice 
of the disciples. The daughter of Jairus, the young man 
of Nain, and Lazarus were raised, not from real death, but 



22 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF CHRIST. 

from a deathlike trance or swoon. The agony in the garden 
was a sudden indisposition caused by the damp night-air of 
the valley. The resurrection of Christ was the return to life of 
one who had been in the grave, swooning from the effects of 
crucifixion, and who was only apparently and not really dead. 
The angels at the head and foot of the tomb were the linen 
clothes, mistaken by the excited women for celestial beings. 
The ascension of Christ to heaven was only his disap- 
pearance behind a cloud which came between him and his 
disciples." 

It will appear, I think, from these specimens, that the so- 
called natural and rational interpretation becomes very 
unnatural and irrational indeed; and that, while we are denied 
true miracles, we are furnished with something like miracles 
of another kind, even miraculous feats of exposition. This 
theory, supposing it accepted, only accounts, even after its 
own manner, for some of Christ's miracles. It fails to 
account for the cures wrought by him while he was at a 
distance, and it gives no explanation of all his other mighty 
works, save the stupidity and mistakes of his disciples. It 
does not explain how even the Pharisees, who certainly did 
not view Christ's works through any medium calculated to 
give them an unduly favourable colouring, were constrained 
to admit his miraculous power, which, unwilling to acknow- 
ledge as Divine, they attributed to Satan. It proceeds on 
the unfounded and arbitrary assumption, that in the gospels 
we have the facts magnified and coloured by the excited 
imagination of the writers — the truth being that the narra- 
tives are of the calmest and most sober character, altogether 
unlike the products of heated fancy or fanaticism ; and that 
there never were historians who gave less of their own judg- 
ments and opinions, and so contented themselves with a 
simple record of occurrences. It requires us to believe that 
these men — who, according to the theory, were so stupid that 
they could not report accurately what they saw, but made 
the greatest blunders in doing so, and so fanatic that they 
mistook natural events for miracles — have yet drawn the 
finest character that ever was depicted, and written the 



THE RATIONALISTIC THEORY. 23 

most simple, the most sober, and the most beautiful of all 
histories. Verily the faith of miracles were easy compared 
with this. The character of Christ cannot be thus accounted 
for. The miraculous is part and parcel of the gospel history, 
and cannot be eliminated without its destruction. It is 
interwoven with the character of Christ, and cannot be 
removed from it without rending the character in pieces. 
Hence even Strauss admits that, if we accept the gospels 
as historical, miracles cannot be banished from the life of 
Christ ; and boldly maintains that they are not historical, but 
legendary. 

This leads us to consider yet one other way of account- 
ing for the character of Christ presented in the gospels. 
This is what is called the mythical theory of the life 
of Christ. According to it, the character of Christ is the 
result of imaginative invention and legendary embellish- 
ment on the part of the early Christian disciples, whereby 
a wise and holy Jew was gradually transformed into the 
Divine Christ. 

In the reign of the Emperor Tiberias, according to this 
theory, an austere teacher and reformer, called John the 
Baptist, made his appearance in Judea. He preached re- 
pentance, and baptized those who professed it and confessed 
their sins. Among those who were baptized by him was 
one Jesus, from Galilee. When John was cast into prison, 
he carried on the work in which his master had been 
engaged. He sought to reform the people by means of his 
wise and holy teaching ; hoping for a Divine interposition 
by which the kingdom of David would be restored. This 
was so much in accordance with the Messianic expectations 
of his countrymen, that they began to think and hint to 
him that he was the Messiah. He was hardly able to 
believe this at first, but gradually brought himself to do so. 
Going up to Jerusalem, he opposed the ecclesiastical 
authorities there, the chief priests and scribes, and through 
their hatred and machinations was put to death by cruci- 
fixion. This was a great shock to the faith of his disciples. 
How were they to reconcile this ignominious death with 



24 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF CHRIST. 

his being the Messiah ? They called to mind passages in 
the Old Testament, in which servants of God were spoken of 
as suffering even to death ; and applying these to the Messiah, 
they brought themselves to believe that he was to suffer 
and die, that thus the death of Jesus was in accordance with 
prophecy, and that, therefore, he was not lost to them, but 
must have risen from the dead and ascended to heaven. 
This belief once entertained, it would have been strange if 
some enthusiastic members of the community had not per- 
suaded themselves that they had seen him. Mary Magda- 
lene, seeing him with the mind's eye, or mistaking the 
gardener for him, converted this into a bodily appearance; 
and hence the fable of the resurrection. As the disciples pro- 
claimed that Jesus was the Messiah, and that he had risen 
from the dead, the question would inevitably arise whether 
he had done miracles such as Messiah was to do. This 
led them to persuade themselves that he had. As he was 
the Messiah, and the Messiah was to work miracles, he 
must have wrought miracles, though they had failed to 
observe and estimate his acts aright. And thus, not intend- 
ing to deceive, but resolved on keeping Jesus as the Messiah, 
they invented the necessary miracles for him, and so viade 
him what they believed and wisJied him to be. Words and 
sayings of his, in which they had seen no miracle before, 
were now regarded as miraculous. His promise to certain 
disciples that he would make them fishers of men became 
the miraculous draught of fishes ; and his declaration that 
every tree that did not bear good fruit would be cut down 
became the withering of the fruitless fig-tree. All that, 
according to their views, the Messiah was to do is attributed 
to him as actually done by him. As he was the prophet 
like unto Moses, he must have done works like those of 
Moses ; and therefore all acts of his that bore any resem- 
blance to the miracles wrought by the great Hebrew leader 
were converted by them into similar miracles. As Moses 
fed the Israelites with manna in the desert, Christ must 
have miraculously fed the five thousand in the wilderness. 
Thus by successive inventions and imaginative fictions, in 



THEORY OF STRAUSS. 25 

which they bring themselves to believe, as the only way of 
keeping up their faith in the Messiahship of a crucified 
Jesus, and of sustaining the Christian cause, they transform 
3. Galilean Jew into the Christ, a wise teacher into a worker 
of miracles, and a good and holy man into the God-man. 
In the second century, four unknown and nameless men 
wrought up these myths and legends into the four narratives 
of Christ's life that we have in the gospels. 

This is the theory which is at present chiefly relied on 
by the opponents of Christianity, and which, with the 
kindred one of Baur, constitutes their great weapon of 
attack on the Christian faith. But, like the rationalistic 
theory which it displaced, it is liable to insuperable objec- 
tions. We can only mention a few of these. In the first 
place, it has been shown by the opponents of Strauss that 
myths or legends belong to the childhood of nations, and 
not to an historic age; and that the formation of such a 
system of myths as is here supposed in the age of the 
gospels — the age of Josephus and other historians — is in- 
credible. It has been shown, in the second place, that 
myths are of slow growth, and take long time for their 
formation; and that there is not sufficient time for the 
myths supposed in this case between the death of Christ 
and the appearance of the gospels, even if we take the dates 
assigned to these by the advocates of this theory, still less 
when we take the dates as given by the highest critical 
authorities. It has been pointed out, still farther, that the 
miracles ascribed to Christ in the gospels are not of the 
kind that are invented, having no marks of myth or legend ; 
and that there are innumerable undesigned coincidences 
in the gospel narratives which are altogether incompatible 
with the supposition of their being fabulous inventions. 

Then it might well be asked. If the Messiah was to do 
miracles, and Christ did none, how, at the first, and while 
as yet no miracles had been invented to accredit him, did 
he come to be accepted and believed on as the Messiah ? 
and how, if his life was so little above what is ordinary, 
did it draw such a halo of mythical glory round it ? " As 



26 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF CHRIST. 

regards the hypothesis," says Schelling', " that the Hfe of 
Christ was adorned by myths, I suppose everyone will 
admit that only such a life is glorified by myths or legends 
as has been already in some manner distinguished and 
moved into a higher region. Now the question is, How 
did this Jewish country rabbi, Jesus, become the object of 
such glorification .'' .... Only if we grant that Christ 
passed for tvhat we have recognised Him to be, is it con- 
ceivable that, in consequence of this opinion, certain 'myths' 
may have arisen. But if we grant this, we must presuppose 
the dignity of Christ, quite independently of the gospels. 
It is not the gospels which are necessary in order that we 
may recognise the majesty of Christ, but it is the dignity of 
Christ which is necessary in order that we may be able to 
comprehend these gospel narratives." Yet further, if the 
early Christian disciples invented Christ's miracles and 
palmed them upon the world, how is it that they were able 
to do this without protest or denial on the part of the 
opponents of Christianity in that age 1 These did not deny 
the miracles of the gospels, but endeavoured to account for 
them by ascribing them to magical or Satanic influence. 

But the great objection to this theory is the moral im- 
possibility of the character of Christ being produced in the 
way alleged. That a character of such transcendent excel- 
lence and beauty, such superhuman dignity and majesty, 
such unity and consistency, was fabricated piece by piece 
by a succession of myths and fables invented by credulous 
enthusiasts, and put together by four men of like spirit, 
who believed and retailed these fictions, is incredible. We 
could sooner believe that a number of ordinary painters, 
acting without concert, each putting in the touch he con- 
sidered necessary, had converted the likeness of some ordi- 
nary man into the Christ of Guido or Murillo, than that the 
common features of a Jewish rabbi were transformed by 
successive touches of myth and fable into the inimitable 
and glorious Christ of the gospels. 

Such embellishment would be equivalent to invention, 
and even sceptics are to be found who regard such invention 



1 

i 



ADMISSIONS OF SCEPTICS. 27 

as impossible. " My friend," says Rousseau, speaking cf 
Christ's portrait in the gospels, " such things cannot be in- 
vented. . . . The gospel contains so great, so astonish- 
ing and perfectly inimitable traits of truth, that its inventor 
would be even more wonderful than its hero." John Stuart 
Mill, while he holds that the miracles of the gospels might 
have been invented by Christ's followers, contends that his 
life and character could not have been so invented. " Who," 
he asks, " among his disciples, or among their proselytes, 
was capable of inventing the sayings ascribed to Jesus, or of 
imagining the life and character revealed in the gospels ? 
Certainly not the fishermen of Galilee ; as certainly not St. 
Paul, whose character and idiosyncrasies were of a totally 
different sort ; still less the early Christian writers, in whom 
nothing is more evident than that the good which was in 
them was all derived — as they always professed that it was 
derived — from the higher source." * 

This theory is at variance with other portions of the New 
Testament which are admitted to be genuine. It is admitted 
by the advocates of this theory that several of Paul's 
epistles are genuine — among them the epistles to the Romans 
and the Corinthians — and that these were written within 
thirty years after the resurrection. It is admitted that the 
Book of Revelation is the genuine production of the apostle 
John. Well, what do these apostolic writings say respecting 
the historic truthfulness of the portrait of Christ given in 
the gospels .<* In the epistles mentioned, Paul speaks of 
Christ in a way which takes for granted that the por- 
traiture of him in the gospels was well known to his 
readers. He speaks of miraculous powers in the Church, 
which imply the miraculous power of the Church's Founder 
as their source. Nay, he expressly attributes to Christ the 
same dignity which is attributed to him in the gospels, 
designating him, among other appellations, " The Lord 
from heaven," and "The Lord of glory." In the Book of 
Revelation, John represents Christ as calling himself 
" The Alpha and Omega;" and speaks of him as "The 
"^ " Essays on Religion," p. 254. 



28 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF CHRIST. 

Lord which is, and which was, and which is to come ; the 
Almighty." These apostles, therefore, held the views of 
Christ's Divine dignity and power, whose origin Strauss 
ascribes to the credulous and enthusiastic Christians of a 
later period, and which, he alleges, found their way into the 
gospels only through their fancies and inventions. 

Nay more, Strauss is obliged to admit, in opposition to 
his own theory, that Christ himself claimed superhuman 
dignity and power. He admits that Matt. xxv. is his- 
torical, and that Christ really said what he is there repre- 
sented as saying. Well, Christ there declared that he 
would come again in his glory, and all the holy angels with 
him — that he would sit upon the throne of his glory — that 
all nations would be gathered before him for judgment, and 
that he would separate them into two great classes, mete 
out to them righteous awards, and so bring about the con- 
summation of all things. Strauss cannot deny that Christ 
said these things, and in doing so raised himself above 
humanity, and therefore he charges him with being a 
visionary, and " guilty of undue self-exaltation." In other 
Avords, he admits that Christ himself claimed that super- 
human dignity and power, the ascription of which to him 
originated, according to his theory, with the early Christian 
community. His theory utterly fails him at this point. It 
is admitted that Christ said what is attributed to him, and, 
on this admission, Christlieb well argues — "Either Christ 
7Utered these sentiments wrongly, in extravagance and self- 
exaltation — and then let any man reconcile them with His 
otherwise perfect moral majesty ; let him explain how, from 
this haughty enthusiast, from this religious leader, who 
himself was subject to sin or error, there could proceed the 
religion of humility and love, and the kingdom of truth 
with its world-regenerating effects ; or, on the other hand, 
Christ was rigJit in speaking these words, and did so with 
full clearness and truth ; hit then He was more than a mere 
man. From this we see that tJiongh all the works of Christ 
should vanish into myths, yet His words 7'emain as an irrefu- 
table proof of His Messiahship and Godhead ; and so does 



MYTHICAL THEORY UNTENABLE. 29 

His consciousness, with the views resulting therefrom of 
His person and dignity as something incompatible with all 
mere human standards. This firm rock is to Strauss a ' stone 
of stumbling which shatters his whole theory to pieces! " He 
adds, in words so beautiful and convincing that we cannot 
withhold them, " The optical illusion of mythicism lies in 
the train of argument, that because in the Church herself 
the higher knowledge of Christ was gradually attained, 
therefore this higher knowledge was invented from the 
imagination of these primitive Christians, though, at the 
same time, we cannot understand how this idea should have 
occurred to them. From the angels' song in the first Christ- 
mas night, down to the words, ' Simon, son of Jonas, lovest 
thou me.-^' coming from the lips of the risen one, the gospel 
history contains a series of pictures so beautiful and grand, 
so perfumed with heavenly grace, that innumerable features 
in it must be recognised as uninventible. Doubtless there is a 
poetry in them ; but it is not that of arbitrary fiction, it is 
the result of holy and divinely ordered facts. Why should 
legends only invent what is beautiful } Why should not 
the finger of God in history trace out an objective beauty of 
facts which exceeds all that human fancy can invent .'* 
Instead of saying that it is too beautiful to be true, each 
man who believes in something more than our common 
every-day life should say, when looking at this page of his- 
tory, ^ It is too beautiful to be mere fiction^ so beautiful that 
it must be true. There is an ideal perfection of beauty 
which is itself the highest reality ; or, to use the words of 
Goethe — 

' The unattainable 
Is here accomplished ;' 

and this beauty it is which shines in the gospels — above 
all, in the delineation which they give us of Christ. Only 
if Ch7'ist really was what He zuas taken for, can zve solve the 
enigma of primitive Christian faith — of the foundation , the 
spread, and the zvorld-renewing power of the Christian Church. 
Christ could only live as God-7nan in the hearts of His fol- 
lozverSy if He really was so Wc look at the 



30 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF CHRIST. 

enormous revolution in the zvorld accomplished through 
Christianity ; we look at \h^ joyful heroism of its co?ifessors, 
braving death ; and at thQ purity of the primitive Christian 
Church, which is born, grows, spreads, and finally conquers 
the world, though placed between a thoroughly corrupted 
Judaism on the one hand, and a no less thoroughly vitiated 
heathenism on the other; and having done so, we consider 
the attempt to explain all this from the fact that a certaiii 
Jezu became convinced that He was the Messiah, zuhereupon 
His disciples, after His death, attributed to Him all sorts of 
miracles, which they drezv from their imagination ; and our 
final conclusion is, that this explanation involves such a7i 
utter disproportioji betzueeji cause and effect, that it is in itself 
the most inconceivable miracle, apiwe Jdstorical impossibility T* 
It will thus be seen that this theory, not less than the 
rationalistic one, fails to give an adequate explanation of 
the life and character of Christ as we have it in the New 
Testament. We fall back, therefore, on what alone furnishes 
an adequate explanation, even the faith of Christendom, that 
Christ lived as described in the gospels, and that hence we 
have this portraiture of him. This is the conviction 
wrought in us by a perusal of the gospel narratives. As we 
read them we are constrained to say, " This is not fiction 
or fable, but reality and truth." And this conviction is 
strengthened by the fact that we have four portraits of 
Christ, one in each of the gospels, each agreeing with itself 
and, in all its important lines and features, with the others. 
It is the same Christ that we have portrayed in each of the 
gospels. The attitude may be different, we may get a dif- 
ferent profile, but it is the same countenance that is depicted, 
the same face that looks out on us from the sacred page. 
This is not denied in the case of the first three gospels, and 
neither can it be denied with truth in the case of the fourth 
gospel. It is the same Christ that is there portrayed, only 
in a different attitude, and from a different standpoint. 
The diversities and apparent discrepancies in the narratives 
prove that there was no collusion among the authors, but | 
" Modern Doubt and Christian Belief," p. 422. 



4 



HIS CHARACTER HISTORICAL. 31 

that they wrote independently of one another; and the fact 
that, notwithstanding this, they give us each the same por- 
trait of Christ, proves that they drew from the same original 
— not from fancy or imagination, but from a real historic 
Christ who had lived and laboured, spoken and acted, 
among them. 

And if Christ spake and acted as described in the gospels, 
then he must have been what he is there represented, and 
what he there claims to be. The very perfection of his 
humanity constrains us to believe that he was more than 
human. His sinlessness in a world of sin compels the con- 
viction that he was no mere shoot out of the stock of a 
sinful humanity, but a Divine graft inserted into it from 
heaven. And his claims — claims made by one who was 
confessedly of the highest moral excellence — leave us no 
alternative but to acknowledge him as the Son of God, 
one with the Father — the object of our supreme love and 
reverence. 

Thus in a historic Christ, who is at once the Son of man 
and the Son of God, and who lived and died as described in 
the gospels, we get the truth of our Christianity and a 
Divine Lord and Saviour. Nay (for our argument may be 
pushed one step farther), we get what some of the scientists 
of our day say cannot be found, a personal and living God. 
The portraiture of the gospels leads us to a historic Christ 
as its only adequate explanation. In a historic Christ we 
find the Son of God, for He was the Christ that should 
come into the world. And the Son of God conducts us to 
One who is His God and Father, who knows Him and whom 
He knows, and therefore to a God who is not impersonal or 
unintelligent, who is not force or matter merely, but who is 
a personal and intelligent Being — One who knows and can 
be known, loves and can be loved — the object of trust and 
supplication, reverence and affection. 

This view of Christ explains everything. It explains the 
portraiture of Him which we have in the gospels. He lived 
the Divine-human life there pictured, and the sacred writers 
have described it accordingly. It explains the miracles oi 



32 ' LIFE AND CHARACTER OF CHRIST. 

the gospels. They were only what might be expected from 
a superhuman Being such as Christ. When He wrought a 
miracle, it was the falling back for a moment of the mantle 
of humanity from His shoulders, and a disclosure of the 
higher nature which it covered. It explains the existence 
and stability of the Christian Church, showing that it has 
for its foundation, not the sand of a mythical and fabulous, 
but the rock of a historical and Divine Christ. It explains 
how Christianity has triumphed over all the assaults that 
have been made upon it. Just as the armed men that came 
out to apprehend our Lord, dismayed by His simple but 
majestic utterance, " I am He," went staggering backwards 
and fell to the ground, so all the assailants of Christianity 
have gone down before the simple majesty of the Christ of 
the gospels. As the ark, when brought into the house of 
Dagon, cast down the idol and brake it into pieces, so the 
Jesus of the gospel history has discomfited and cast down 
all the opponents of His claims. They have fallen on this 
stone and been broken. 

This Christ meets our wants and satisfies the yearnings 
of our souls. Our hearts ask for another God than the god 
of the materialist, even the materialists themselves being 
judges. They ask for a God who can know and pity, hear 
and help, forgive and bless — who can be an object of rever- 
ence and veneration, of confidence and love. And the 
Christianity which in this lecture we have sought to vindi- 
cate gives such a God. It gives us the God who was revealed 
in Jesus of Nazareth — a God who has an eye to see and an 
ear to hear, a heart to pity and a hand to save — a God who 
is the rest of the sin-laden, the Saviour of the soul, the 
Redeemer from sin and death, the Resurrection and the Life. 
This God meets our wants — our souls can rest in Him. We 
say, therefore, with Peter — " Lord, to whom shall v/e go ? 
TJioii hast the words of eternal life. And we believe and are 
sure that Thou art that Christ, the Son of the living God." 




I 



— f- 

REV. WILLIAM MAGILL. 



M 



ACHIEVEMENTS OF THE BIBLE. 



♦ •♦ 



ALL natural objects are engaged in tracing a map of their 
■ movements, and in affixing their signatures. Meteors 
leave their track of light ; leaves cast their shadows as they 
fall. The earth is furrowed by streams ; the track of 
animals that roamed long, long ago over chaos is cut in 
stone ; and even raindrops have written their history in the 
solid rock. What has the Bible done for men, and on man's 
world ? Its annals — are they replete with records of good 
done, wrongs redressed, men saved, and God glorified .-* 
What are the facts ? 

I. The book itself commands attention. The Vedas, the 
writings of Confucius, and the Koran are modern com- 
pared with it. When it was laid in complete form on the 
table of the world, it was found that forty centuries had 
made contributions of their best things to it. Its author- 
ship is spread over sixteen hundred years. It has been 
copied during thirty centuries ; and survived the wreck of 
empires, of mythologies, and philosophies — ministering to 
the true needs and deepest challenges of humanity. It has 
been assailed by all evil things ; yet, in its turn, it has borne 
down on them with a power that destroys them. In har- 
mony in itself with all the laws of God's kingdoms, it moves 
with an energy derived from the Spirit. On opening its 
pages, we feel as if all around were unearthly and sublime, 
as if we approached the throne of its eternal Author ; 
" while," in the language of Claude, " an unknown heaven 
appears opening on our meditations, in which we behold, as 
it were, a thousand burning luminaries, whose rays, gushing 
from every side, bewilder the eyes, and dazzle while they 
flood them with intolerable glory." 



4 ACHIEVEMENTS OF THE BIBLE. 

In the very constitution of the Bible there is evidence of 
one Divine mind, acting through and above all human agents 
for the production of one grand result — the eternal purpose 
of redemption in Christ Jesus. As the sun mirrors himself 
only in a calm ocean, so the living personal Jehovah mirrors 
Himself in the Bible as the God of providence and redemp- 
tion, making the one uniform claim of faith on all men — faith 
in the Lord Jesus and in His kingdom. As the revelation 
of salvation, it is the book of life, of unsearchable wealth, 
of Divine fulness — a copy or manifestation of the living 
Saviour ; trying and judging all other sacred books in the 
world ; the arbiter in history, in literature, and in morals. 
The vigour, beauty, and purity of the ethical parts of the 
Bible ; the matchless simplicity and charm of its histories ; 
the sun of prophecy which has never set, but has rolled 
down a flood of light to our day ; the poetry which, in 
"flow and fire, in crushing force, in majesty that still seems 
to echo the awful sounds of Sinai, is the most superb within 
the breast of man" — all these have made the Bible a mighty 
power in the world, through its influence on the human 
mind. The God whom it teaches us to worship is the only 
absolutely perfect One in holiness and love that man has 
ever known ; nor heaven, nor earth, nor hell has known 
another Saviour besides the Lord Jesus whom it reveals ; 
and the religion which it brings is the only one on the 
earth that does not degrade man and insult God. 

2. The Bible has encountered prejudice, storm, and un- 
dying hate. The Veda had no foes, the Zend-Avesta no 
enemies ; and the Greeks accepted with acclamation the 
poems of Homer. Why is not the Bible, with its power to 
inspire the loftiest intelligences with love and veneration, 
with its matchless morals and its sublime spirituality, the 
book of every class of men, and of all men ? Why do men 
of thought often look coldly on it.? How comes it that 
in this scientific age there is a spirit abroad of alienation 
from it ? The ancient classic literature, which has charmed 
the intellectual world for twenty centuries, is pagan in 
ethics and mythology, and, therefore, antagonistic to the 



i 



THE BATTLES OF THE BIBLE. 5 

Bible. Modern letters, conformed in a great degree to 
ancient models, and derived from those fountain-heads, 
follow frequently the same course in depicting moral great- 
ness ; in ignoring those moral principles and sentiments 
peculiar to revealed religion ; in propounding theories of 
life, happiness, and immortality that are not distinctively 
Christian ; in overlooking wholly, or partially palliating, the 
depraved moral condition of man, and in neglecting redemp- 
tion by Jesus Christ. 

In looking into the schools of ancient philosophy, we 
see a faithful picture of heathen thought — of the inability 
of the loftiest intellect to arrive at truth, and of the 
dimness of their light even at the best. These sages, 
debauched by false science, spoke in the language of gods, 
and in reference to morality and religion sank lower than 
brutes. The intelligent belief in a future state, and the 
knowledge of moral obligation, were alike wanting in them. 
Some introduce us into the dark cave of materialism ; 
others, like the modern sceptics, founded their freedom on the 
denial of every duty, and the obedience of every impulse — 
reason their only guide, " at one time the moderator, at 
another the menial of passion ;" while others, like the Stoics, 
gave the world "a virtue without affections, a religion without 
a God, and a soul without a future." The struggle between 
the theories and spirit of paganism and the principles of the 
Bible is not yet over. The infamous doctrines which pre- 
vailed in the France of the eighteenth century, notwith- 
standing the bloody commentary furnished on them by the 
Revolution, are rising again in formidable array even in our 
own country ; and, culminating in the atheism of Comte, 
they seem to aim at the uprooting of all faith in the Bible. 
If for twenty centuries Holy Scripture has withstood every 
attempt to corrupt it, every cruel effort to wrench the signet- 
ring of God from its finger, and every insidious war against 
the religious instincts of this million-peopled world — do not 
the hates that have pursued it, the fires that have been 
kindled to burn it, and the rude assaults of successions of 
infidels on it, prove it Divine and unconquerable. Thus 



6 



ACHIEVEMENTS OF THE BIBLE. 



they treated the Just One, and thus they treated His 
book. 

3. The knowledge communicated by the Bible is unique, 
saving, and of infinite value. No other book of any age or 
nation gives the same view of sin — as the violation of moral 
law, as an evil of infinite magnitude, as involving everlasting 
punishment, and as mirrored only in the sufferings and 
death of the Son of God. This is one of the discoveries 
that stamp the book with transcendent power and utility. 
Alone in the literature of all time, it presents to men the 
true idea of God — in essence, self-existent ; in holiness and 
majesty and all moral attributes, infinite ; in wisdom and 
sovereignty, absolute — and this God seen in the face of 
Jesus Christ, crowned with a love which fills, and shall for 
ever fill, the virtuous universe with the lights and splendours 
of Godhead. And to this book alone, of all books, we are 
indebted for the idea of that redemptive system, of which 
the central figure is Immanuel — a personality so strange, 
new, peculiar, so suited to man in his indigence and guilt, 
and so suited to God for the manifestation of Himself as 
Rector and Father of the universe, that the mind of man or 
angel never could have suggested or conceived it. The 
speculations of Vedas, Korans, and heathen sages on theo- 
logy fall infinitely short. They are rushlights held up to the 
sun. The religions founded on them are without morals and 
without evidences. 

The religion of the Bible is not poetry, a code of 
morals, or a series of rhapsodies — it is a salvation from 
sin and death. The negations of Islam repudiate the 
divinity and propitiation of the Lord Jesus, and substitute 
fabulous creeds. The gods of the heathen were and are 
unholy ; and their worshippers, coloured and transformed 
by their homage, resemble them in immorality, cruelty, and 
misery. The sacred literature of Paganism possesses small 
claim to attention. It gives no reliable information. It 
has involved the great majority of the human race in dark- 
ness, and subjected them to a sure process of deterioration, 
which became greater as age succeeded age ; and history 



ITS PRECIOUSNESS FOR SAVING KNOWLEDGE. T 

proves the inability of men to redeem themselves from 
idolatry, or restore humanity to its primeval purity and 
happiness. Let the contributions made by the Bible to 
human knowledge be fairly considered — let them be weighed, 
estimated, and compared, and they will be found to involve 
the recovery of man, his enlightenment by truth along the 
whole line of his immortality, and the germination within 
him of a new life, which has no superior in the universe but 
the life of God. The quality of this knowledge has been 
tested by time — by the fires of persecution, the scalpel of 
genius and erudition — by men in every condition, and by 
death-beds innumerable as the buds of spring — by the ridi- 
cule and sneer of the sceptic, and by the more perilous 
weapons of unscientific disbelief ; and the result has proved 
it to be saving, Divine, infinite — possessing in itself the 
potency of all greatness and of all good. 

4. The Bible is the mainspring of civilisation. Like 
the straight line of which Leibnitz speaks, which is con- 
stantly approaching the curve but can never meet it, man 
possesses the capacity of indefinite improvement and pro- 
gress towards God. Pascal teaches that, in respect of 
his essence, man is thought ; and he argues his greatness 
from his misery. Howe depicts the ruins of a stately 
palace, where God once dwelt, in terms of matchless force 
and beauty — leaving it to be inferred that the glory of 
humanity lay in its being the temple of Deity. Hall founds 
human dignity on its present probationary state and on 
immortality. But the real greatness of man is mirrored 
only in the seas of Divine love, of the blood of Jesus, and of 
the glory of human nature in the person of the Mediator. 
This fact, peculiar to the Bible, and unknown to all the 
sacred books of the world's religions, is the essential prin- 
ciple from which springs all true civilisation. Of all books, 
the Bible alone sets forth man in his sin and misery, and in 
the massive and transcendent capacities of his immortal 
essence. 

Now experience proves that since the world began 
no tribe of savages from within itself civilised itself The 



b ACHIEVEMENTS OF THE BIBLE. 

growth of the natural sciences and of architecture among 
the Eg}-ptians, the progress of philosophy and the fine arts 
among the Greeks, and the development of law among the 
Romans, are historical results of supernatural truths regard- 
ing God and man, and remission of sin by bloodshedding 
only ; which, floating down from the origin of society on the 
\\-ings of tradition, crj-stallised themselves in the earliest 
centres of population, and, through the communion of 
nations, overspread and in part moulded these great 
peoples into those wondrous forms of national life which 
their annals disclose. From Babylon, through Ethiopia, 
the Eg)'ptians derived their enterprise and their civilisation. 
The early Greeks, characterised by extreme simplicit}' and 
grandeur, were indebted to the Phoenicians and Eg}*ptians; 
and the Romans formed their magnificent national life out 
of elements furnished by Umbrians, Trojans, Greeks, and 
Hebrews. The civilisation of India and China has been 
fossilised for twenty centuries, in the course of which there 
has been a gradual deterioration of morals ; and Islam has 
stereot>'ped societ}' in the lust, and pride, and ferocit}-, and 
despotism, and barbaric pomp of the seventh centur}*. If 
these empires, which contain or command eight hundred 
millions of our race, are modifying their tj'rannies and ap- 
proaching the verge of modern civilisation, they owe it to 
the pressure of nations where the Bible is the unseen power 
that rules. 

As to law, more than a thousand years before Justinian 
reformed Roman jurisprudence, the statutes of the Hebrew 
people were published. If, like Grecian art, the efiect of 
Roman law is extensive and permanent — excelling the 
conquest of the world by arms — how much mightier in the 
construction and regeneration of kingdoms and peoples 
must have been the Divine law given in the Pentateuch ? 

As to freedom, more than tvvo thousand years before 
^lagna Charta the rights of peoples and the powers 
of princes were chartered in the Word. The immortal 
principle embodied in the Bible, that God alone is Lord of 
the conscience, has done more for the emancipation of man, 



THE BIBLE THE SOURCE OF TRUE FREEDOM. 9 

for moral freedom and civil liberty, than all the efforts, 
sufferings, and literature of Mohammedan and pagan nations 
put together. How comes it that true freedomi, good 
government, constitutional law for the protection of life, 
property, and liberty, hatred to despotism and political 
virtue, are unknown among peoples ignorant of the Bible.'' 
The Word is the author of all the heroic contendings which 
have won modern freedom, and erected it on an imperishable 
basis. Poets have sung, and martyrs have died, and patriots 
have fought, and tyrants have trampled out the fires of 
liberty ; but while the world stands, the Bible will breathe 
it into the soul of man. 

As to marriage, let men of moral idea compare the 
institute of marriage — founded, hallowed, and encompassed 
by Divine laws and sanctions — with the polygamy, the 
ineffable impurity and misery, of family life in Mohamme- 
dan and Pagan nations, and they will see something of 
what the Bible has done for man. Where else is home 
found ; or woman enthroned in the sanctities of freedom, 
love, and purity ; or society sweetened by tenderness and 
moral feeling ; or culture in the arts that embellish life and 
multiply its enjoyments ; or the relations of life pervaded 
and regulated by a sense of moral obligation ; or truth made 
the basis of all life, of all law and commerce and institutions; 
or the majesty of law blended and shaded, for the public 
weal, with the rays of mercy — unless where the Holy Scrip- 
tures dictate the faith and morals of men. 

And as to education — the birthright of every man and 
the greatest power on earth for good — who could tell 
what the Bible has done in the world ! If it has not done 
all, it is because its voice has been unheard amid the din 
of worldly interests, and its authority repelled by the 
depravities of men. Beyond the sphere of its beams, 
the culture of the disciples of Brahma, Confucius, and 
Mohammed is poor, unworthy of the moral and intellectual 
nature of man, and utterly unable to confer the peerage 
of true manhood. If education should reach the body, 
soul, and spirit of man, transforming all alike, and shed- 



10 ACHIEVEMENTS OF THE BIBLE. 

ding- on all the radiance of highest excellence for citizen- 
ship, for virtue and happiness, it must be conformed to 
the rule and breathe the spirit of the Bible. For nations 
like the Roman, who burned out the Bible — placing laws, 
force, and hierarchies in its stead — have corrupted in their 
own superstitions, and their remains lie entombed in history. 
And nations like Spain and France, who, in their battle with 
the Bible to expel it from their coasts, have shed blood 
enough to make a lake, are hung up before the eyes of the 
world, to teach, by their crimes, their degradation, their judg- 
ments, and their sufferings, that the Scriptures are the pillars 
of kingdoms, " the parents of social order, which alone 
have power to curb the passions of men and to secure to all 
their rights, to nobles their honours, to the rich the rewards 
of their industry, and to princes the stability of their thrones." 
5. The Bible influences and regenerates literature. Early 
in the history of the world, the mind of India embodied 
itself in a literature which, beginning in theology, embraced 
some science and art, and ramified into poetry, metaphysics, 
and mythology. The Chinese literature, rich in prose and 
verse — in history, geography, romance, moral philosophy, 
and mechanical arts — is of vast extent, and not unworthy 
of the attention of scholars. The literature of Greece, 
in point of classic form, is a model, and has told power- 
fully on the culture and education of the world. And not 
unlike these, in some respects, is the learning of the Dark 
Ages, when the Bible was imprisoned in a cell — when 
Aristotle ruled the schools of thought, and the monk pre- 
sided over the mind, morals, and politics of Europe. These 
literatures are continents of rubbish, into which, if the form, 
which is often of exquisite beauty, could be separated from 
the putrid substance which it enshrines, no scholar should 
refuse to descend in search of the golden mine, from disgust 
at the base alloy which mingles itself with the ore. Com- 
pared with the literature of which the English language is 
now the vehicle, all these are as night to the moon. If 
you compare, in its transcendent greatness, English litera- 
ture to a globe, then, undoubtedly, if the Bible is not its 




INFLUENCE OF THE BIBLE ON LITERATURE. 



11 



creator, it fashioned, moulded, inter-penetrated, and gave 
to it its substance. The Holy Scriptures furnish specimens 
of consummate art in history, poetry, parable, law, and 
morals ; and in their matter they are inspired by God. 
The writers are kings among men ; and their words are 
models for the orator, the spring of all progress, the bloom 
of all beauty, the charter of eternal life — having in them 
the seed of statesmanship, of jurisprudence, of the light 
and wealth of nations. From these models history has 
learned to criticise, to delve and hew for hid treasures, to 
search for the roots of things ; and even the splendid 
historical monuments of the genius of Mill, Hume, and 
Gibbon, in their relations to the Bible, remind one of the 
eagle whose blood is drawn by the arrow which its own 
wing has feathered. In poetry, too, the Bible has exerted 
pre-eminently its power. Here there is reason to believe 
Shakespeare learned to play on the human heart as on a 
harp ; Milton conceived his matchless epic ; the great 
masters of modern song got their imagery, their themes, 
their sweetness, their simplicity ; and even Byron, Shelley, 
and Burns, like Dante, are orbs belted all around, and 
streaked with light, and fire, and beauty, borrowed uncon- 
sciously from the lively oracles of God. 

The highest meed of earthly honour, according to Bacon, 
belongs to the founders of empires ; does it not belong to 
himself, as the founder or restorer of modern philosophy, in 
a greater degree ? Yet the leading ideas of his system — 
that men ought to observe and study the works of God, and 
that wisdom is strength — are clearly biblical. Here Newton 
learned his love of truth, and his genius for generalisation 
gathered patience to stand peering through tlie lattice, till 
he wrested from nature her secrets, and made light paint 
his immortal portrait. Here Herschel and Murchison and 
Faraday lighted their lamps to travel over the physical 
universe, and lead the march of mind where the forces of 
matter hold their secret conclave, to the stone-chambers in 
the crust of the earth, where the mundane archives are 
stowed away, and to the throne of blue, where the centre 



12 ACHIEVEMENTS OF THE BIBLE. 

of creation — the Eternal — sees, rules, and wields the suns 
and systems of the universe, which are but the drops of 
His fulness, and the shadows of His glory. And if, begin- 
ning at the brilliant era of Elizabeth, science has been 
building her pyramid for three centuries, and Christian 
civilisation collecting her wonderful treasures of human 
good, and poetry embellishing it with garlands more varied 
and beautiful than earth ever saw before; if the sun of 
freedom is shining for man with a ray almost bright, and in 
an area almost as broad as the sky ; and if theolog}^, with 
its pure truth and perfect morals, its power to bless time 
and light up eternity with the splendours of day, has come 
to crown the edifice which three centuries have been rearing 
with that wealth of supernatural life and glory which is the 
tide-mark now of human improvement, and the prophecy of 
yet grander things for men in God's world — all is owing to 
the force, and control, and life, and spirit of the Bible. 
True science, sound learning, ethical philosophy, modern 
civilisation, sit down in the dust uncrowned before the 
lively oracles of God, and lay their spoils on the altar of 
Revelation. 

6. All the powers and fruits of the Bible already men- 
tioned are small compared with its achievements in morals. 
It is Dictator here, and reigns without a rival. It alone 
reveals a perfect code in the form of moral law ; it alone 
exhibits a perfect pattern in the life of the Lord Jesus. As 
a fallen intelligence, man is placed under sovereignty of 
law, to which, in his will and conscience, he is to be subject. 
And the training of a moral being belongs to God. An 
ethical education makes a man true and good, pure and 
graceful, faultless and benificent, the object of reverence and 
love. In consequence, morality without God is impossible, 
for it must have an absolute law founded in the nature of 
Deity. Nor is this all. There must be reconciliation 
through the Son of God, and regeneration of heart by the 
Spirit — enabling the soul of man to snap the chains of its 
depravity, and walk the path of ethical obedience. Without 
these, men are dreaming enthusiasts, or creatures of ascetic 



ITS STANDARD OF MORALS. 13 

sentiment. Man has never discovered, never could discover, 
a perfect rule of duty. The Bible not only does that, but 
adds sanctions, asserts human responsibility, and aims at 
ruling the will by motives in reference to all the moral dis- 
tinctions of right and wrong, which necessarily associate 
themselves with God. The materialistic philosophy makes 
morality impossible — resolving itself into the pagan scep- 
ticism which made truth falsehood, right wrong, and good 
evil. 

In Hume's speculations the possibility of a science of 
morals is denied, and, proceeding from the Creator of the 
world by inevitable necessity, he says that " human actions 
can have no turpitude at all." In Rousseau and Voltaire, 
morality culminates in libertinism ; with Comte, in fatalism. 
And experience shows that atheism, morality, and govern- 
ment by moral law are incompatible. Of all heathen 
systems of morals it may be affirmed that they are fragments, 
broken and imperfect, handed down from hoar antiquity. 
The Brahmin resolves the highest virtue into asceticism, 
and the loss of conscious personality ; the Boodhist, into 
universal grief and annihilation ; the Chinese, into natural- 
ism and politics ; while among the most enlightened of the 
Greeks, morality was based in knowledge, and virtue made 
wholly a matter of intelligence, a thing exclusively of time. 
We have before shown that the Holy Scriptures alone reveal 
the real nature of sin in the light of that eternal redemption 
which, glorious and stupendous beyond all thought, sets 
this world of our life before us as a mystic arena, in which 
a conflict is waged for deliverance from everlasting punish- 
ment and the enjoyment of life eternal. For the true 
morality for which, during forty centuries, God was pre- 
paring men, has its majestic principle in holy love — a love 
which is through faith ; and has introduced into the world 
for all time, and for eternal expansion, right views of truth, 
duty, justice, purity, humility, man, and God — germs of all 
the good that can confer distinction, and of which humanity 
is capable, and which even infidelity has admired for its 
great and transcendent excellence. Let it be remembered, 



14 ACHIEVEMENTS OF THE BIBLE. 

as a moral axiom, that sound morals can only grow out of 
sound principles. The immorality of men and nations who 
are and were destitute of the Bible is such that no true 
picture could be presented of it ; and their indescribable 
depravation is the logical result of their pagan principles. 
In that morality — over every part of which, as a system, the 
Bible, which is sublimely ethical, sheds beauty, and to every 
rule of which it communicates power — every man, every 
household, every nation in existence has an infinite interest. 
Strike down the Bible, and you will have the universal 
debauchery of heathenism. Exchange the Bible for the 
dictate of unaided reason, and for a time you may dwell in 
the shade of art, and play at the gymnastics of eloquence ; 
but come at length it will, and the glory of modern society 
shall go up in rottenness — introducing the reign of ignorance, 
cruelty, sensuality, and despair. For Deism, pure theism, 
natural religion, materialism, scepticism, infidelity, atheism, 
are the successive stages of that historical rationalism, 
which for the last three centuries has been at work in 
Europe, and reddened its annals with atrocities of crime and 
blood " which, for the safety of their performers, had to be 
enveloped in everlasting night." The Bible is the book for 
humanity, not only because it contains all necessary truth 
and a perfect moral code — things of which all other reli- 
gions are destitute — but because there is a resistless energy 
in it to renew and purify the moral nature of our species, 
an energy which it has proved on a thousand fields of 
fame, over thirty centuries of time, in every variety of 
human condition, and in open conflict with all the powers 
of earth and hell. It has wrestled with an apostate Judaism ; 
with heathenism, encamped amid the pomps and grandeur 
of imperial Rome ; with the philosophies of the Greek 
schools, buttressed by all the charms of human learning 
and exalted genius ; with the traditional superstition of the 
*' man of sin," whose hostility to the written Word kept 
Christendom for ten centuries a prison-cell for saints, for 
freedom of conscience, for freemen, and for saving truth ; 
and now, in the end of the world, when systems of specula- 



THE BIBLE THE FOUNTAIN OF TRUE RELIGION. 15 

tion are rising on our horizon, varied and unsubstantial as 
November meteors — now linking themselves to the orb of 
science, now to metaphysics, now to the spawn of an over- 
weening egotism, now to the importations of German or 
Indian exuvise, and often to an intellectual sky-rocket, to 
attract notice and alarm the vulgar — the Bible stands forth 
in its integrity, the palladium of moral freedom, the only 
true spring of individual and rational excellence, the con- 
servatory of all the roots and fruits of Divine virtue, which 
alone has power to cleanse the earth of paganism, and to 
restore man to himself and to God by the science of right 
and of truth. 

7. But the main use of the Bible has been to originate 
and sustain true religion in the world. The facts of human 
consciousness prove, in opposition to the materialist, that 
there is a spiritual as well as sentient and intellectual 
nature in man. As light suits the eye, or water the thirsty 
one, so is the Bible to the spiritual wants of humanity. An 
impulse to worship is an essential ingredient in the human 
soul. And it is a fixed law of mind that the character of 
the object worshipped moulds the votary into its form and 
likeness. If the social system of pagan lands, in every 
epoch of history, has dissolved in moral corruption, idolatry 
is the cause. And not only so, but, left to itself, the volume 
of corruption becomes deeper and more wide-spread in pro- 
portion as the fine arts, power, and wealth increase — as in 
the age of Pericles in Greece, and of Augustus at Rome. 
The evidence of all time and of all the facts is that the 
spiritual nature in man is supreme over the intellectual and 
moral — that every effort, stimulated by human religions, to 
promote happiness without heart-purity, is vain — that there 
are desires and capacities in the soul which the wisdom of all 
the ages cannot satiate — that the sense of guilt has such a 
mastery over the soul of humanity that no form of man- 
made worship has power to exorcise it — and that intellectual 
greatness, apart from holiness, has never saved individuals 
or converted states. 

Wc hold it proved that the best forms of religion 



16 ACHIEVEMENTS OF THE BIBLE. 

which the reason of man has discovered have failed in 
producing, in a single instance, spiritual character. The 
Bible has done this in millions of cases. Employing as 
its only weapon, truth, it repudiates the force and des- 
potism of other religions. It presents God in all the 
radiancy of an infinitely holy love ; and this suits the heart 
of man. It sheds light on morals, on men, on salvation, on 
the life to come — a clear and certain lip;ht ; and this fits in 

to his reason. It reveals an absolution from sin which, ? 

i 
founded on the loving self-sacrifice of a Divine substitute, * 

does not compromise perfect rectitude or blot the Divine 
character and law, and that suits all the requirements of 
conscience. It imparts from its Divine author a new life 
which, consisting in love, lifts its possessor into the fellow- 
ship of the Absolute One ; and, embracing eternity in its 
provisions, runs up the road of perfection, scattering every 
gift that can make existence a blessing — thus fitting divinely 
in to the needs of his immortal essence. For forty centuries 
and more this tree of life has been wafting holiness, life, and 
happiness through this sinful world ; and its saving odour 
is still exhaustless. It has taught men all that time how to 
live ; it has enabled them to die. It has brought real hap- 
piness into the world ; and, wherever it has been received, it 
has drained the fountains of human misery. It has saved 
the felon in his cell, the savage in his war-paint, Paul in 
his harness of hate, and Augustine in his vice. It has been 
the pillow of the martyr's peace — the parent of humility, 
self-sacrifice, and hope. It has beautified whatever it touched, 
quickened souls innumerable, and imparted consummate 
finish to ideas, to taste, and to genius. The purest comfort 
of earth drops from its word into hearts broken by bereave- 
ment or indigence. It is the key of knowledge. It has con- 
ducted pilgrims innumerable to the celestial mansions ; for 
it alone possesses the secret of salvation. 

Look over the dreary centuries of the past, and as you see 
the lights of religions and civilisations and philosophies and 
empires, one after another, sinking below the horizon, and 
perceive the holy light of the Bible flashing its rays with ever- 



ITS TRUE RELIGION. 17 

increasing brilliance over the seas of human sin and sufifering-, 
the blessing and majesty of the book will surely grow on you. 
Three centuries ago it held up a torch among the Alps, in 
the centre of Germany, in France, and in the United King- 
dom ; and to recount its fruits would be to write the annals 
of spiritual Protestantism in the regeneration of individuals 
and of nations. Its creations are peerless. Compare in 
moral and spiritual excellence Demosthenes with Chalmers 
— the death of Cicero with that of Robert Hall. The whole 
history of human religions cannot produce a Wilberforce, 
or furnish a Howard. There is not a death-bed like Hali- 
burton's in the whole history of the world outside the Bible. 
Compare the last end of Hume, Voltaire, Mirabeau, and 
even Mill, with the death-beds of Payson and Rutherford 
and Knox. The heathen and Mohammedan religions never 
produced a Henry Martin. Among Reformers, compare 
Mohammed, in point of spiritual character, with Knox ; 
among churchmen, Hildebrand with Calvin ; among bene- 
factors of their race, Boodha or Confucius with Luther. 

Glorious book ! myriads of men have died for it ; churches 
live in its shadow ; commonwealths grow up under its aegis ; 
and the ages take their main characteristics from its sove- 
reign spirit. It has added to the dominions of saving truth 
several hundred islands in the South Seas. In the might 
of a conqueror it has invaded Madagascar. It has planted 
a tree in India which shall yet cover all the land. It has 
belted Africa with light, and lit fires in China that shall 
never go out. It has robed itself in the dress of two 
hundred and ten forms of speech, languages, or dialects. 
Since the beginning of this century more than eleven mil- 
lions of money have been spent by societies in its circula- 
tion ; and above one hundred and twenty millions of copies 
have gone out with their cargo of light and life among the 
nations. The wild cry — "What must I do to be saved.-*" — 
rings out in our ears as two-thirds of the human race 
kneel before their idols and shriek out their lament ; and 
the Bible alone can answer it. Another age or two of 

active hostility against the Bible on the part of scientists 
B 



18 ACHIEVEMENTS OF THE BIBLE. 

and infidels, and there will not be a homestead on earth 
without its copy of the Holy Scriptures. This is our shout 
of defiance — let the whole corps of sceptics show, if they 
can, a man who has been made a liar, or obscene, or a thief, 
or a tyrant, or proud, by the Bible. Nay, if they will 
not have this book to rule them, let them make a better. 

Suppose — and they claim the highest mind of the age on 
their side — that they were assembled to provide a substitute 
for the Bible. The philosopher, the atomic scientist, the 
critic, and the theoretic atheist, are all there. The Comtist 
furnishes the history without a miracle or a special provi- 
dence ; the scientist narrates the work of creation out of an 
atom — or by development, or natural selection, or proto- 
plasms — by fortuitous concourses, or by nothing; the philo- 
sopher, who has resolved all the realities and possibilities of 
existence into matter, dictates a code of ethics and law 
which eliminates from human consciousness moral obliga- 
tion and free agency ; the critic proudly boasts that his con- 
tributions contain a higher rule of duty than the moral law — 
a more perfect model of excellence than the sinless Jesus ; 
and the sceptical theorist insists that no mention or refer- 
ence shall be made to God, on the ground that there is no 
sufficient evidence of His existence. Would the book, thus 
formed — the magnificent product of the " illuminati," " the 
highest mind of the age" — convert the world and supplant 
our Bible ? Let the papal, the material, the intellectual ] 
forces dash themselves against the Book of God ; we cling 
to it because it is guarded by the holiness and omnipotence 
of its Author, throws the shield of its inspiration over our 
beliefs and our prospects of eternal life, has uprooted a long 
series of evils in Protestant Christendom ; and because, in 
the institution of the Sabbath alone, the Bible has done 
more for man — for his rest, culture, and prosperity, in all 
his relations — and for God, in reference to the spread of f 
saving knowledge and the maintenance of true religion, 
than all other religions, backed by the infidel mind of 
all the ages, from the time of Moses to our own. 

The Bible, which holds in custody truth so precious, has 



THE sceptic's BIBLE. 19 

entered on a new era of triumph, in which the mighty 
achievements of the past shall be eclipsed by movements 
deep as human thought or earth's misery, and high as the 
mind of the future. In virtue of its sovereign authority, it 
will yet settle all the questions that have arisen between the 
Church and the age. Flaming in the centre of the world, 
its beams will put to flight priestcraft, multiply education, 
dissipate error, and lift man into an erect posture in hope 
of immortality. 

The infidel comes to rob us of our peace and our pros- 
pects, and to throw the shade of negation over the glory 
that awaits us. And for the Bible and Christ and joy 
and the resurrection, of which he would rob us, what does 
he offer ^ A little science, some poetry, strong negations, 
a sigh, and perhaps a sneer. Infidelity is poor, for it has no 
Divine revelation : it is narrow; for, the creature of sense, it 
makes the present time all : it is deaf; for it hears not the 
voice of God in His word : it is foolish; for it wars against the 
greatest, strongest, best things in the universe of God. What- 
ever great men may arise to reform physical science, like 
Newton and Pascal ; or, like Clarkson and Wilberforce, to 
break the fetters of the slave ; or, like the Reformers, to 
bring men from, darkness to the light of life ; whoever they 
may be that shall open the mines of grace and truth to a 
perishing world, the Bible will be their armoury, their in- 
spiration, their joy. Can it be that because God has not 
shut up every avenue by which His testimony can be 
evaded, that men, in their pride, "will not deign to accept 
His mercy ?" The alternative is not the Bible or man-made 
religions, the Bible or materialism. No : the awful alternative 
for every living man that has ears to hear is, obey the Scrip- 
tures or you perish. 

There is a spirit abroad which ranges over the world 
of thought, peers into the rocky strata of the earth, tra- 
verses space to the confines of the star-dust land — which 
questions light, and heat, and electricity, and force, and 
the structure of plants and animals, and self-evident truth, 
such as the argument from design — and when a fact is 



20 



ACHIEVEMENTS OF THE BIBLE. 



discovered, which may be twisted into apparent hostility to 
the testimony of the Bible, it is lifted up like Milton's star 
that " flamed in the forehead of the sky," and is compelled 
to do duty against the Majesty of Revelation ; the burden 
of which is that God hath given to us eternal life, and this 
life is in His Son. Can human sin go further in unreason- 
ableness than this ? One would think that such good news, 
authenticated by myriads of witnesses, by miracle, and 
prophecy, and adaptation to the condition of the race and 
its own essential luminousness, would be welcomed by every 
man ; that the great masters of mind would be the first to 
greet the majestic dawn of inspiration, and that from their 
ranks armies of explorers would be ever issuing to gather 
from the universe confirmatory evidence for the Divine 
testimony — evidence assuming the form of a new ''Analogy" 
by a new Butler ; now of a new book of thoughts by another 
Pascal ; and now of a series of astronomical sermons by 
another Chalmers. If the sun were plucked from the centre 
of the system, leaving behind him death and darkness, it 
would be a small thing compared with the destruction of 
the Bible. But what — borrowing the language of an eloquent 
writer — if it be lawful to indulge such a thought, would be 
the funeral obsequies of a lost Bible ? " Where shall we 
find the tears fit to be wept at such a spectacle ? or could 
we realise the calamity in all its extent, what tokens of 
commiseration and concern would be deemed equal to the 
occasion } Would it suffice for the sun to veil his light, and 
the moon her brightness ; to cover the ocean with mourn- 
ing, and the heavens with sackcloth ? or were the whole 
fabric of nature to become animated and vocal, would it 
be possible for her to utter a groan too deep, or a cry too 
piercing, to express the magnitude and extent of such a 
catastrophe .?" For all the light that ever chased the gloom 
of doubt, roused dejection, or cheered the bosom of 
despondency ; for whatever gives confidence to faith, 
brightness to hope, and fervour to devotion ; for all the 
knowledge the world ever had of life and immortality; 
for whatever can tranquillise the mind in life, and min- 



I 



THE GREAT WORK AND TEST OF THE BIBLE. 21 

ister consolation at the last hour, we are indebted to the 
Bible. 

In primitive times theology was the^chosen field of conflict ; 
in the Dark Ages it was the philosophy of mind, and now it 
is physical science. Look forward a little, and in the temple 
of truth you will see all nations assembled, making offerings 
to the God of the Bible. Here is freedom with her charter, 
and barbarism with her rudeness, and civilisation with her 
inconceivable grandeur, and science with her glorious dis- 
coveries, and the slave with his fetters, and art with her 
achievements, and mind with the cream of its thought, 
and music with its melody, and all earth with its gold, to 
put honour on Him whose Word has become the light of 
the world — a Word which, to be loved, has only to be known. 
And as for scepticism, what has it done ? What immoral 
man has it reformed ? What savage has it reclaimed.-* 
What barbarous tribe has it civilised ? What wilderness 
has it turned into a smiling Eden ? Over what continent 
has it poured out its philanthropies, to ameliorate the mass 
of the people .? On what death-bed has it shed the light of 
a blessed hope ? What has its questionings, its gloom, and 
its despair accomplished for the deliverance of the human 
race from sin and misery .-* 

Of all the facts of science, none is better established 
than that the mind of the natural man is enmity against 
God. Let the pantheist bring his abstractions, the atheist 
his black cup of despair, the infidel the chemistry of his 
philosophical conceit, and the new school of materialists 
the atom of matter which possesses all the potentialities 
of life and mind, to dissolve that enmity, and replace it 
by the love of God. " Jesus I know, and Paul I know ; 
but who are ye ?" will be the scornful defiance. The 
Bible alone, as has been proved in millions of instances, 
possesses the true solvent — is able to make wise, and is the 
power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth. 

Some one has said that a deep mathematic brings us nearer 
the source of all number — the Infinite One; a deep astro- 
nomy, a profound geology, carries us closer to the Lord of 



22 



ACHIEVEMENTS OF THE BIBLE. 



heaven and earth ; and I say that a deep philosophy draws 
us near that great God, around whom the Bible throws the 
majestic robes of light, love, and grace. When the history 
of scepticism, in all its Protean forms, comes to be written, 
it will be found that it is based in and built up of credulity ; 
and when the annals of Bible-work shall be completed, it 
will be seen that faith in the Divine testimony of the Bible, 
which is the seed of the world's life, and the lamp of the 
world's light — that God hath given us eternal life, and this 
life is in His Son — is a reasonable service. 

8. The Bible has opened up to mankind the true springs 
of happiness. Every one knows that there is nothing on 
earth to reward the pursuit or satisfy the yearnings of man. 
The richest treasures of time are the glitter of the stars upon 
the water ; and poor is that felicity which is gathered out- 
side the gates of paradise. Man is born to sorrow ; and all 
the evidence charges his suffering on his sin. The plague 
of misery invades the palaces of princes as well as the 
criminal's cell. No country or generation or order of men 
is exempt. The air is burdened with wailing for departed 
kindred. And the deepest sufferings of the soul are within 
— arising from the consciousness of guilt and the dread of 
retribution. Death, in very deed the king of terrors, pro- 
jects his shadow over all the gay glories of time ; and the calm 
with which it is met is the torrent's smoothness ere it dash 
over the precipice. Now where is the fountain of comfort.'* 
Is it found in the face of nature; or in the popular religions 
to which the intellect, the imagination, and the conscience 
of men have given birth ? Does the sacred water of life, 
which alone has the potency to assuage human sorrow, flow 
from the lips of the infidel, as in his cave of gloom he spins 
out the threads for that net of despair which he would fain 
throw over creation } Oh no ; the spring of all consolation 
is in that religion which has in it an expiation, a pardon as 
full as it is sweet, a life realising the ideal of perfection, a 
harmony between justice and grace, a paradise of love in 
light, a God in whom infinite good and right reside, an 
eternity made of joy. How grandly did the Divine Author 



THE BIBLE THE MAINSPRING OF HAPPINESS. 23 

of Christianity begin His ministry by the announcement of 
the eight beatitudes ! " If there be joy in the world," says 
Kempis, "it belongs to the man of a pure heart." The 
whole revelation of God — promise, prophecy, invitation, 
precept — rains joy. Great peace, deepening into something 
that passes all understanding, and swelling up into a joy 
unspeakable and full of glory, is the blessed experience of 
the believer in the Bible. Seeing outwardly only tears and 
a cross in the Christian, natural men have stigmatised the 
religion of the Bible as gloom. Could they pierce the 
breast of the believer, they would find the God of all consol- 
ation enshrined in the heart. Power, wealth, love, pleasure, 
are the equipage of happiness ; but they are not happiness. 
Whether in the abode of indigence or the palace of royalty, 
amid the sons of toil or the favourites of fortune, in solitude 
or society — wherever the broken heart clothes itself in 
humility and feeds on Holy Scripture, it finds delight in 
God, a delight which elevates and satisfies by stretching 
away into eternity. The Bible blesses the cradle ; it kindles 
a torch in the long home where the pious dead are laid. It 
sanctifies and diminishes every misfortune. It made Roches- 
ter say that he would not commit the least sin to gain a 
kingdom. It enabled Robert Hall to exclaim in death, 
" Very comfortable, very comfortable," while he described 
his body as an "apparatus of torture;" and, pillowed on the 
Holy Book, Payson could say, as he was departing, " The 
sun of righteousness has been gradually drawing nearer 
and nearer, appearing larger and brighter as he approached ; 
and now he fills the whole hemisphere, pouring forth a flood 
of glory, in which I seem to float like an insect in the beams 
of the sun ; exulting, yet almost trembling while I gaze on 
this excessive brightness, and wondering with unutterable 
wonder why God should deign thus to shine upon a sinful 
worm." 

What gladness is brought in the tidings of a finished 
redemption and the resurrection-life ! And the world to 
come, is it not sinless — the abode of a joy at once full and 
eternal ? For the sum of all saving knowledge, the marrow 



24 ACHrEATlMZXTS OF THE BIBLE. 

of the Bible, is this, that man was made to glorify God and 
enjoy Him for ever. Take from the righteous man whatever 
he holds dear ; subject him to the frowns of fortune and 
the blasts of penury ; let him rot in a dungeon or pine 
away in agony ;■ it is the lesson taught by the annals of the 
world that his Bible and his Bible alone inspires him with 
fortitude, and in the hope of infinite riches and joy through 
immortal duration, banquets his soul on the happiness of God. 

We challenge the whole army of infidels to produce a 
single authenticated instance of an intelligent man who on 
sceptical principles enjoyed happine?? in Ufe and |>eace in 
death. On the other hand, no fact in histor\' is better 
attested than that individuals more numerous than the stars 
of heaven, of ever\" nation and people — of every age, rank, and 
sex — of ever}- grade of intelligence and intellect — of every 
age since the year of grace — of everj- variet}' of circumstance, 
from indigence to roj-altj^, from the bloom of youth to the 
fires of martjTdoTTi — ^have, through the faith of the Bible, 
enjoyed a happiness which the world could not give or take 
away, and met death with a triumphant joy, like the home- 
life of the better land to which they were going. 

Let the present infidel crusade against Holy Scripture suc- 
ceed, and what then ? We lose our ci\-il and religious liberties 
— lapsing into the despotism of heathen cruel t\-. We lose the 
splendid trophies of Christian ci\-ilisation, and sink into 
barbarism. We lose the blessings of marriage, and exchange 
our happy home for the lust and life of the sensual savage. 
We lose the holy, just, good code of moral law, and drift on 
the swollen stream of depravity' at the bidding of the windy 
speculations of the philosophers. We lose the Sabbath, 
which is our rest and the gospel of our salvation, and the 
river of life from which we drink comfort, and sink into the 
Dead Sea of a putrid atheism ; and upon the graves of the 
dead we shall see written the gospel of desj>air — death is an 
eternal sleep. 

Of all the questions that agitate the human mind this 
is the greatest — Is the Bible an authentic and genuine reve- 
lation from God.' If the twelve hundred millions of our 



WHAT WOULD BE LOST BY LOSING THE BIBLE. 25 

race were met to consider what they would do in case the 
sun set to rise no more, the matter would be unimportant 
in comparison. If some great foe of our race poisoned the 
fountains of the globe, and dried up its waters with the sole 
of his foot, it would be nothing when compared with the 
sealing up of the three Bible fountains — the mercy of God, 
the blood of Jesus, the grace of the Spirit — from which, for 
sixty centuries, have issued the plentiful streams of grace 
and salvation. Suppose that the solar system were turned 
into a gem of purest ray serene, and made over to a man, it 
would be a trifle compared with the Bible. 

This holy book is the manna of the world. It is the map of 
a river, in which whosoever washes is healed of the leprosy of 
sin ; and in the radiant bloom of health he comes forth to a life 
which soars above the highest seraph, and is ever stretching 
towards God. Milton grandly described the Archangel 
Uriel as descending to the earth in a sunbeam. The reve- 
lation of the Bible is a beam on which the Father of lights 
descends into men to dwell with them. Sweeter than the 
dews of six thousand summers is the living bread which the 
Bible brings to a perishing world. What though it rained 
gold and pearls and kings' crowns on our guilty race, it 
were better to give them the Bible. Salvation ! Weigh it 
against all created things. Measure it by eternity. Lay 
the plummet of infinity to its blessings. Appeal to Him 
who weighs the mountains in scales and the hills in a 
balance to teach you its worth. Climb to the throne of the 
Eternal, where the universe collects her glories to decorate 
the palace of our King, and thence survey all things that are 
made. Salvation excels all you know and see ; for it makes 
God Himself your everlasting portion. 

And if the time should ever come when it will rain 
infidels, there is a truth which no science can impeach, no 
learning undermine, no hate can annihilate ; and that truth 
is — oh that I could carry it round the world ! — that they 
are a happy people who know the joyful sound, and whose 
God Jehovah is. Give the revelation of the Bible in its 
simpHcity, holiness, and majesty — the inspired Word of 



9f / p3ox( 

26 ACHIEVEMENTS OF THE BIBLE. vO^ 

God — to the mind and heart of the human race, till they 
taste and see its grace and truth, its light and life ; and soon 
the red dawn of that day of applied redemption for the 
whole world, to which seers and saints looked forward, 
will be seen on the mountains ; for very joy the wilderness 
shall rejoice and blossom as the rose ; the sigh for renewal, 
which this groaning creation has emitted, shall find its 
response in the bloom of a new heavens and a new earth, 
in which, as in a mountain-lake, heaven will n^irror itself; 
man shall replace on his brow the crown of fine gold, 
undimmed, that had long since fallen from his head ; this 
perturbed world shall become a Beulah of beauty, the calm 
home of peace, a Goshen of abundance, the worthy avenue 
of an immortal Paradise ; and from the throne of His 
triumphant Mediatorship, He who has the keys of hell and 
of death shall look down in complacency, and the light of 
His countenance beam full upon it. 



'MARCUS WARD AND CO., PRINTERS, ROYAL ULSTER WORKS, BELFAST. 



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